


^. S' 






O 

.*^ •'*., 






.'«-• 



.3^ % 



^^^ s^^ 



<^ 


> 





N 


C 




-<. ' ' 


(■ *> 


0- 


c 








^ 


' ^^ 





-r. 



o^ 






s^'' ■'J;-^'"/=v- 












.^^ 






,A^ 



^ , ' .-'i .' -i ^ .0 c 



^.,^' ::^' 









^^" '-iU 






U* ,<\ as '■ 

•V? ■>;• » •■!. 
.0^ 



\^' .\.*?^^i=^^ ^^. 









% r- 









^' o>' 



O 



\ • ... •?,. ^ « ' ^ * , 









^. » » . ^ * 



•^i-. 



■•% ^'^ 
X'^^'^ 



c*-- - 



.r> 



V - 






"^z ^ 






x^ -^^^ 



/.\-."..%;-"\>^..^o,.%^--X..^«,,%'> 












A^' 



O- -0 



#• ^> 






•^ 



;>^^ 



.^^" 



.0^ . s ^ 



^z- v-^'' 



0>' 



'■1^ 





•y- y' 




^^'^.. 








■i 



•;^ . o N 



o 






-i'"^ s- 



,^^ -^t. 









.^ 



v- 



V 



<o 



COMPENDIUM 



IMPENDING CRISIS 



THE SOUTH. 



BY 

HINTON ROWAN HELPER, 

OF NORTH CAROLINA. 



CocNTRTMEN ! I SUB for Simple justice at your hands, 

Naught else I ask, nor less will have ; 

Act right, therefore, and yield my claim,- 

Or, by the great God that made all things, 

I'll fight, till from my bones my flesh be hack'd l—Shakspeare, 

The liberal deviseth liberal things. 

And by liberal things shall he stand. — Isaiah. 



NEW YORK : 
A. B. BUEDICK, PUBLISHER, 

Fo. 8 SPRUCE STREET. 
1859. 



E^4-9 



cAssixjs m:. ci^^y, 

OF KENTUCKY, 

FRAJSrCIS I». BL^IR, Jr., 

OF MISSOURI, 

OF NORTH CAROLINA, 
AND TO THE 

NON-SLAVEHOLDIXG WHITES OF THE SOUTH, GENERALLY, 

WHETHER AT HOME OR ABROAD, 
THIS WORK IS MOST CORDIALLY DEDICATED 

BT THEIR 

SmCEEE FRIEND AND FELLOW-CITIZEN, 

THE AUTHOR. 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by 

A. B. BUR DIOK, 

Id the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern District of New York. 



W. H. TiNSON, Stereotyper. Geo. Russeli. Il Co., Printers. 



PREFACE. 



If my countrymen, particularly my countrymen of the South, still more particularly inose 
of them who are non-slaveholders, shall peruse this work, they will learn that no narrow 
and partial doctrines of political or social economy, no prejudices of early education, have 
induced me to write it. If, in any part of it, I have actually deflected from the tone of true 
patriotism and nationality, I am unable to perceive the fault. What I have committed to 
paper is but a fair reflex of the honest and long-settled convictions of my heart. 

In writing this book it has been no part of my purpose to cast unmerited opprobrium upon 
slaveholders, or to display any special friendliness or sympathy for the blacks. I have 
considered my subject more particularly with reference to its economic aspects as regards 
the whites— not with reference, except in a very slight degree, to its humanitarian or religious 
aspects. To the latter side of the question. Northern writers have already done full and 
timely justice. The genius of the North has also most ably and eloquently discussed the 
subject in the form of novels. New England wives have written the most popular anti-slavery 
literature of the day. Against this I have nothing to say ; it is all well enough for women to 
give the fictions of slavery ; men should give the facts. 

I trust that my friends and fellow-citizens of the South will read this book— nay, proud as 
any Southerner though I am, I entreat, I beg of them to do so. And as the work, considered 
with reference to its author's nativity, is a novelty— the South being my birth-place and my 
home, and my ancestry having resided there for more than a century — so I indulge the hope 
that its reception by my fellow-Southrons will also be novel ; that is to say, that they will 
receive it, as it is offered, in a reasonable and friendly spirit, and that they will read it and 
reflect upon it as an honest and faithful endeavor to treat a subject of vast import, without 
rancor or prejudice, by one who naturally comes within the pale of their own sympathies. 

An irrepressibly active desire to do something to elevate the South to an honorable and 
powerful position among the enlightened quarters of the globe, has been the great leading 
principle that has actuated me in the preparation of the present volume ; and so well con- 
vinced am I that the plan which I have proposed is the only really practicable one for 
achieving the desired end, that I earnestly hope to see it prosecuted with energy and zeal, 
until the Flag of Freedom shall wave triumphantly alike over the valleys of Virginia and 

the mounds of Mississippi. 

H. B. H. 

Jime 21, 1859. 



CONTENTS, ALPHABETICALLY AKKANGED. 



Adams, John Quincy, 116. 

Addison, Joseph, 207. 

Agassiz, Louis, 7. 

Agricultural Products, 20. 

Alexander II. of Russia, 126, 141. 

American Emigrant Aid and Homestead Co., 

203. 
Animals Slaughtered, Value of, 40. 
Area of the several States and Territories, 71, 

72. 
Aristotle, 128. 
Attorneys-General, 186. 

Bailey, Gamaliel, 159. 

Bailey, William S., 164 

Banlc Capital of the several States, 173. 

Banks, Nathaniel P., 147. 

Bapst, M. 126. 

Baptist Testimony, 183. 

Barley, 20. 

Barlow, Joel, 207. 

Barnes, Albert, 130. 

Beans and Peas, 21. 

Beattie, James, 124. 

Beecher, Henry AVard, 154. 

Beeswax and Honey, 36. 

Bellows, Henry W., 155. 

Benton, Thomas H., 99. 

Berdan, Hiram, 69. 

Bible Testimony, 138-140. 

Bible and Tract Cause, 179. 

Birney, James G., 102. 

Blackstone, Sir William, 122. 

Blair, Francis P., Sen., 143. 

Blair, Francis P., Jr., 148. 

Boiling, Phillip A., 101. 

Booth, Abraham, 134. 

Brisbane, William H., 138. 

Brissot, 125. 

Brougham, Lord, 12.3. 

Brown, B. Gratz, 151. 

Browne, K. K., 191. 

Buckwheat, 21. 

Buffon, 125. 

Buike, Edmund, 123. 

Burleigh, C. C, 166. 

Burleigh, Wm. Henry, 166. 

Burlingame, Anson, 149. 

Burns, Robert, 120. 

Bushel— measure Products, 22. 

Butler, Bishop, 1.32. 

Butter and Cheese, 86. 

Cameron, Paul C.,2T. 
Canals and Railroads, miles of, 178. 
Cane, Sugar, 8G. 
Carey, Henry C, 151. 
iv 



Cartwriglit, Dr., of New Orleans, 182. 

Catholic Testimony, 136. 

Chandler, Mr., of Virginia, 101. 

Channing, Wm. E., 114. 

Chapin, E. H., 155. 

Chase Salmon P., 143. 

Cheese and Butter, 86. 

Cheever, George B., 154. 

Churches, Value of, 178. 

Cicero, 127. 

Cities, nine Free and nine Slave, 198. 

Clarke, Dr. Adam, 1.34. 

Clarke, Judge, of Mississippi, 107. 

Clay, Henry, 99. 

Clay, Cassius M., 141, 144, 182. 

Clay, C. C, 81. 

Cleveland, C. D., 181. 

Clinton, DeWitt, 117. 

Clover and Grass Seed, 21. 

Coke, Sir Edward 123. 

Colonization Movements, 88. 

Colonization Cause Contributions, 179. 

Commercial Cities — Southern Commerce, 195- 

200. 
Comparisons between the North andthe South, 

7-61. 
Conway, M. D„ 162. 
Corn, Indian, 20. 
Corwin, Thomas, 150. 
Cotton, 86. 

Cowper, William, 122. 
Crops per Acre, 88, 39. 
Curran, John Philpot, 123. 
Curtis, Mr., of Virginia, 54. 

Darien (Georgia) Resolution, 112. 

Davis, Thomas, 16S. 

Deaths in the several States in 1850, 180. 

DeBow, J. D. B., 17. 

Decrease of Agricultural Products, 44. 

Dublin University Magazine, 123. 

Elliott, Chas. W., 165. 
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 150. 
Emigration to Liberia, 88. 
Emperor of Russia, 126, 141. 
England, Viace of, 120. 
Episcopal Testimony, 1.32. 
Etheridge, Emerson, 84. 
Expenditures of the several States, 45. 
Exports and Imports, 172. 

Tacts and Arguments by the Wayside, 201- 

206. 
Farms, Cash Value of, 40. 
Faulkner, Charles James, 53, 85. 
Fee, John G., 168. 



CONTENTS 



Five Points, Election at the, in 1S56, 82. 

Flax, 85— Flax Seed, 21. 

Fortescue, K=ir John, 12.3. 

Fox, Charles James, 121. 

France, Voice of, 124, 

Franking Privilege, availed of, 211. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 114. 

Free Figures and Slave, 171-194. 

Free Labor Movements in the South, 202. 

Free White Agriculturists in the Slave States. 

180. 
Freedom and Slavery at the Fair, IDl. 
Fremont, John Charles, 144. 
Prothingham, O. B., 1G4. 
Furness, Wm. Henry, IGT. 

Garden Products, Value of, 21. 

Garrison, Wm. Loyd, 153. 

Gaston, Judge, of North Carolina, lOS. 

Georgia, Slavery in. 111. 

Germany, Voice of, 125. 

Giddings, Joshua R., 149. 

Godwin, Parke, 165. 

Goethe, 125. 

Goodell, William, 156. 

Goodloe, Daniel R., 161. 

Greece, Voice of, 128. 

Greeley, Horace, 157. 

Griffith, Mattie, 160. 

Grimke, Sarah, M., 160. 

Grotius, 125. 

Grow, Galusha A., 149. 

Hale, John P., 146. 

Hamilton, Alexander, 115. 

Hammond, Gov., of South Carolina, 80, 1S2. 

Hampden, John, 123. 

Harrington, James, 123. 

Hay, 29, 35. 

Hedrick, B. S., 161. 

Hemp, 35. 

Henry, Patrick, 96. 

Hildreth, Richard, 164. 

Honey and Beeswax, 86. 

Hops, 85. 

Horseley, Bishop, 182. 

How Slavery can be Abolished, 62-90. 

Huddlestone, M. P., 121. 

Hurlbut, WilUam Henry, 110, 188. 

lUiterate Poor Whites of the South, 204. 
IlUterate AVhite Adults, 176, 212. 
Imports and Exports, 172. 
Indian Corn, 20. 

Inhabitants to the Square Mile, 143. 
Inventions, New, Patents issued on, 178. 
Iredell, Judge, of North Carolina, 100. 
Ireland, Voice of, 123. 
Italy, Voice of, 127. 

Jay, John, Judge, 115. 
Jay, John, Esq., 17,132. 
Jay, William, 116. 
Jefferson, Thomas, 94. 
Johnson, Oliver, 130. 
Johnson, Samuel, Dr., 122. 

Kansas, Aid for, 188. 
Eapp, Frederick, 125. 

Lactantius, 128. 

Lafayette, Gen., 124—0. Lafayette, 124. 

Langenschwarz, Dr. Max, 126. 

Lawrence, Abbott and Amos, 55. 

Leavitt, Joshua, 156. 

Leigh, Mr., of Virginia, 101. 



Leo X., 128. 

Liberia, Emigration to, 88. 

Libraries other tlian Private, 175. 

Lieber, Francis, 62. 

Live Stock, Value of, 40. 

Locke, John, 121. 

Long, John Dixon, 168. 

Louis X., 125. 

Luther, Martin, 125. 

McDowell, Gov. of Virginia, 100. 

McKim, J. Miller, 166. 

McLane, Louis, 100. 

Macaulay, T. Babington, 207. 

Slacknight, James, 124. 

Madison, James, 96. 

Mansfield, Lord, 120. 

Manufactures, products of, 172. 

Maple Sugar, 85. 

Marion, Francis, 110. 

Martin, Luther, 103. 

Blartineau, Harriet, 122. 

Marshall, Thomas, 100. 

Maryland, Slavery in, 103. 

Mason, James M., 107. 

Mason, Col., of Virginia, 100. 

Massachusetts and North Carolina, 9. 

Mattison, Hiram, 135. 

May, Samuel J., 156. 

Mayo, A. D., 167. 

Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence, 

106. 
Methodist Testimony, 184. 
Militia Force of the Several States, 174. 
Miller, Prof., of Glasgow, 124. 
Milton, John, 122. 

Missionary Cause Contributions, 179. 
Monroe, James, 96. 
Montesquieu, 124. 
Moore, Mr., of Virginia, 54. 
Morgan, Edwin D., 147. 
Mortality in the Several States, 180. 

Newspaper and Periodical Statistics, 176. 

New York and Virginia, 8. 

New York and North Carolina, 192. 

New York Courier and Enquirer, 158. 

New Y'ork Herald, 209. 

New York Times, 54, 157. 

New Y'ork Tribune, 209. 

North American and United States Gazette, 

57, 58. 
North Carolina, Slavery in, 104. 
North Carolina and Massacliusetts, 9. 
North Carolina and New York, 192. 
Northern Testimony, 114-119. 
Northerners in the Slave States, 184. 
Nott, Dr. J. C, 183. 

Oats, 20. 

Oglethorpe, Gen., 111. 
Olmsted, Fred. Law, 168. 
Orchard Products, Value of, 21. 

P.arker, Theodore, 158. 

Pauloff, M.,127. 

Patents Issued on New Inventions, 178. 

Peas and Beans, 21. 

Pennsylvania and South Carolina, 10. 

Perry, B P., 111. 

Philadelphia North American, 57, 68. 

Phillips, Wendell, 152. 

Pierpont, Jolin, 1.37. 

Pinknev, William, 101. 

Pitt, William, 121. 

Plato, 128. 



VI 



CONTENTS. 



PoUok, Uobert, 130. 

Polybius, 128. 

Poor ■Whites of tlie South, ISl, 1S2, 183, 204. 

Pope Gregory XVI., 13(3. 

Pope Leo X., 12S. 

Popular Vote for President in 1S5C, 177. 

Population of the Several States, 71, 72. 

Porteus, Bishop, 1.32. 

Po.stinasters-General, 186. 

Post Office Statistics, 174. 

Potatoes, 20. 

Pound-Measure Products, 37. 

Powell, Mr., of Viiginia, 54. 

Presbyterian Testimony, 130. 

Presidents of the United States, 185. 

Presidential Elections since 1796, 188. 

Preston, Mr., of Virginia, 102. 

Prettyman, James D., 163. 

Price, Dr., of London, 122. 

Products per Acie, 38, 89.. 

Public Scliool Statistics, 175. 

Queen Victoria, 121. 

Hailroads and Canals, miles of, 173. 

Randolph, John, of Roanoke, 97. 

Randolph, Thomas M., 97. 

Randolph, Thomas Jefferson, 93. 

Randolph, Peyton, 98. 

Randolph, Edmund, 93. 

Raymond, Henry J., 157. 

Raynal, The Abbe, 137. 

Real and Personal Property, 45. 

Reid, Mr., of Georgia, 112. 

Republican Newspapers in the South, 204. 

Revenue of the Several States, 45. 

Rice, 36. 

Richmond Enquirer, 49. 

Rives, Mr., of Virginia, 54. 

Rousseau, 125. 

Ruffin, Judge, of North Carolina, 107. 

Russia, Voice of, 126. 

Rye, 20. 

Schools, Public, 175. 

Schurz, Carl, 125. 

Scotland, Voice of, 124. 

Scott, Thomas, (Commentator,) 132. 

Secretaries of State, 1S5. 

Secretaries of the Interior, 186. 

Secretaries of the Treasury, 1S7. 

Secretaries of War, 187. 

Secretaries of the Navy, 187. 

Settlement of the Several States, Period of, 

and their admission into the Union, 191. 
Seward, Wm. H., 142. 
Shakspeare, 121. 
Slaveholders, Number of, 72, 73. 
Slaveholders Classified, 73. 
Slaves, Value of, at $400 per head, 184. 



Slavery, how it might be Abolished, 62. 

Slavery Tlioughtful— Signs of Contrition, 208. 

Smith, Gerrit, 148. 

Snodgrass, J. E., 162. 

Socrates, 128. 

South Carolina and Pennsylvania, 10. 

South Carolina, Slavery in, 109. 

Southern Literature, 207-214. 

Southern Testimony against Slavery, 91-118. 

Speakers of the llouse of Representatives, 

186. 
States, the Several, when First Settled, 191. 
Statistics, Science of, 16, 17. 
Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 159. 
Sugar, Cane, 36. 
Sugar, Maple, 35. 
Summers, Mr., of Virginia, 102. 
Sumner, Charles, 145. 
Supreme Court, .Judges of, 185. 
Swaim, Benjamin, 108. 

Tappan, Lewis, 156. 

Tarver, M., 80. 

Taylor, Wra. C, LL.D., 16. 

Territories, the, Area and Population of, 72. 

Testimony of the South, 91-113. 

Testimony of the North, 114-119. 

Testimony of the Nations, 120-129. 

Testimony of the Churches, 130-187. 

Testimony of the Bible, 138-140. 

Testimony of Living Witnesses, 141-170. 

Thompson, Joseph P., 154. 

Tobacco, 85. 

Tonnage of the Several States, 172. 

Tract Cause Contributions, 179. 

Underwood, John C, 161, 204. 

Victoria, Queen, 121. 

Virginia— Bill of Rights, 103. 

Virginia and New York, 8. 

Votes cast for President in 1856, 177. 

Wade, Edward, 147. 
Warren, Joseph, 117. 
Washington, George, 93. 
Wayland, Francis, 183. 
Wealth of the Several States, 45. 
Webb, J. Watson, 158. 
Webster, Daniel, 116. 
AVebster, Noah, 117. 
Weed, Thurlow, 158. 
AVeld, Angelina E., 160. 
Weld, Theodore D., 169. 
AVe..*ley, John, 1.34. 
Weston, George M., 79. 
Wheat, 20. 
AVilson, Henry, 145. 
AVise, Henry A., 8, 49. 
AA'ool, 36. 



CHAPTER I. 

00MPAEIS0N3 BETWEEK THE FEEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 

Comparisons are at the bottom of all philosophy. It is by comparisons that we ascertain 
the difference which exists between things, and it is by comparisons, also, that we ascertain the 
general features of things, and it is by comparisons that we reach general propositions. 
Without comparisons we never can generalize. Without comparisons we never could go 
beyond the knowledge of isolated, disconnected facts.— Aqassiz. 

It is not our intention in this chapter to enter into an elaborate 
ethnographical essay, to establish peculiarities of difference, mental, 
moral, or physical, in the great family of man. Neither is it our design 
to launch into a philosophical disquisition on the laws and principles of 
light and darkness, with a view of educing any additional evidence of 
the fact, that as a general rule, the rays of the sun are more fructifying 
and congenial than the shades of night. Nor yet is it our purpose, by 
writing a formal treatise on ethics, to draw a broad line of distinction 
between right and wrong, to point out the propriety of morality and its 
advantages over immorality, nor to waste time in pressing a universally 
admitted truism — that virtue is preferable to vice. Self-evident truths 
require no argumentative demonstration. 

What we mean to do is simply this: to take a survey of the relative 
position and importance of the several states of this confederacy, from 
the adoption of the national compact ; and when, of two sections of the 
country starting under the same auspices, and with equal natural advan- 
tages, we find the one rising to a degree of almost unexampled power and 
eminence, and the other sinking into a state of comparative imbecility 
and obscurity, it is our determination to trace out the causes which have 
led to the elevation of the former, and the depression of the latter, and 
to use our most earnest and honest endeavors to utterly extirpate what- 
ever opposes the progress and prosperity of any portion of the Union. 

This survey we have already made ; we have also instituted impai*- 
tial comparisons between the cardinal sections of the country, north, 
south, east, and west ; and as a true-hearted southerner, whose ancestors 
have resided in North Carolina between one and two hundred years, and 
as one who Avould rather have his native clime excel than be excelled, wo 
feel constrained to confess that we are deeply abashed and chagrined at 
the disclosures of the comparisons thus instituted. At the time of the 



8 COMPAKISONS BETWEEN TIIE 

adoption of the Constitution in 1789, we commenced an even race with 
the North. All things considered, if either the North or the South had 
the advantage, it was the latter. In proof of this, let us introduce a few 
statistics, beginning with the states of 

NEW TOEK AND VIRGINIA, 

In 1790, when the tirst census was taken, New York contained 340,120 
inhabitants ; at the same time the population of Virginia was 748,308, 
being more than twice the number of New York. Just sixty years after- 
ward, as we learn from the census of 1850, New York had a population 
of 3,097,394; while that of Virginia was only 1,421,661, being less than 
half the number of New York! In 1791, the exports of New York 
amounted to $2,505,465 ; the exports of Virginia amounted to $3,130,865. 
In 1852, the exports of New York amounted to $87,484,456; the exports 
of Virginia, during the same year, amounted to only $2,724,657. In 1790, 
the imports of New York and Virginia were about equal; in 1853, the 
imports of New York amounted to the enormous sum of $178,270,999: 
while those of Virginia, for the same period, amounted to the compara- 
tively pitiful aggregate of only $399,004. In 1850, the products of 
manufactures, mining and the mechanics arts in New York amounted to 
$237,597,249 ; those of Virginia amounted to only $29,705,387. At the 
taking of the last census, the value of real and personal property in Vir- 
ginia, including negroes, was $391,646,438; that of New York, exclusive 
of any monetary valuation of human beings, was $1,080,309,216. 

In August, 1856, the real and personal estate assessed in the City of 
New York amounted in valuation to $511,740,491, showing that New 
York City alone is worth far more than the whole State of Virginia. 

What says one of Virginia's own sons ? He still lives ; hear him 
speak. Says Gov. Wise : 

" It may be painful, but nevertheless, profitable, to recur occasionally to the his- 
tory of the past ; to listen to the admonitions of experience, and learn lessons of 
wisdom from the efforts and actions of those who have preceded us in the drama 
of human life. The records of former days show that at a period not very remote, 
Virginia stood preeminently the first commercial State in the Union ; when her 
commerce exceeded in amount that of all the New England States combined ; 
when the city of Norfolk owned more than one hundred trading ships, and her 
direct foreign trade exceeded that of the city of New York, now the centre of 
trade and the great emporium of North America. At the period of the war of 
independence, the commerce of Virginia was four times larger than that of New 
York." 

The cash value of all the farms, farming implements and machinery 
in Virginia, in 1850, was $223,423,315 ; the value of the same in New 
York, in the same year, was $576,631,568. In about the same ratio does 
the value of the agricultural products and live stock of New York 
exceed the value of the agricultural products and live stock of Virginia. 
But we will pursue this humiliating comparison no further. With feel- 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. » 

ings mingled with indignation and disgust, we turn from the picture, and 
will now pay our respects to 

MASSACHUSETTS AND NOETH OAEOLINA. 

In 1790, Massachusetts contained 378,717 inhabitants; in the same 
year North Carolina contained 393,751 ; in 1850, the population of 
Massachusetts was 994,514, all freemen ; while that of North Carolina 
was only 869,089, of whom 288,548 were slaves. Massachusetts has an 
area of only 7,800 square miles; the area of North Carolina is 50,704 
square miles, which, though less than Virginia, is considerably larger 
than the State of New York. Massachusetts and North Carolina each 
have a harbor, Boston and Beaufort, which harbors, with the States that 
back them, are, by nature, possessed of about equal capacities and 
advantages for commercial and manufacturing enterprise. Boston has 
grown to be the second commercial city in the Union ; her ships, 
freighted with the useful and unique inventions and manufactures of lier 
ingenious artisans and mechanics, and bearing upon their stalwart arms 
the majestic flag of our country, glide triumphantly through the winds 
and over the waves of every ocean. She has done, and is now doing, 
great honor to herself, her State and the nation, and her name and fame 
are spoken with reverence in the remotest regions of the earth. 

How is it with Beaufort, in North Carolina, whose harbor is said to 
be the safest and most commodious anywhere to be found on the 
Atlantic coast south of the harbor of New York, and but little inferior 
to that ? Has anybody ever heard of her ? Do the masts of her ships 
ever cast a shadow on foreign waters ? Upon what distant or benighted 
shore have her merchants and mariners ever hoisted our national 
ensign, or spread the arts of civilization and peaceful industry ? What 
changes worthy of note have taken place in the physical features of her 
superficies since "the evening and the morning were the third day?" 
But we will make no further attempt to draw a comparison between the 
populous, wealthy, and renowned city of Boston and the obscure, des- 
picable little village of Beaufort, which, notwithstanding " the placid 
bosom of its deep and well-protected harbor," has no place in the annals 
or records of the country, and has scarcely ever been heard of fifty 
miles from home. 

In 1853, the exports of Massachusetts amounted to $16,895,304, and 
her imports to $41,367,956; during the same time, and indeed during 
all the time, from the period of the formation of the government up to 
the year 1853, inclusive, the exports and imports of North Carolina were 
60 utterly insignificant that we are ashamed to record them. In 1850, 
the products of manufactures, mining and the mechanic arts in Massa- 
chusetts, amounted to $151,137,145; those of North Carolina, to only 
$9,111,245. In 1856, the products of these industrial pursuits in Massa- 



10 COMPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 

chusetts had increased to something over $288,000,000, a sum more than 
twice the value of the entire cotton crop of all the Southern States! In 
1850, the cash value of all the farms, farming implements and machinery 
in Massachusetts, was $112,285,931 ; the value of the same in North 
Carolina, in the same year, was only $71,823,298. In 1850, the 
value of all the real and personal estate in Massachusetts, without recog- 
nizing property in man, or setting a monetary price on the head of a 
single citizen, white or hlack, amounted to $573,342,286 ; the value of 
the same in North Carolina, including negroes, amounted to only 
$226,800,472. In 1856, the real and personal estate assessed in the city 
of Boston amounted in valuation to within a fraction of $250,000,000, 
showing conclusively that so far as dollars and cents are concerned, that 
single city could buy the whole State of North Carolina, and by right of 
purchase, if sanctioned by the Constitution of the United States, and by 
State Constitutions, hold her as a province. In 1850, there were in 
Massachusetts 1,861 native white and free colored persons over twenty 
years of age who could not read and write ; in the same year, the same 
class of persons in North Carolina numbered 80,063 ; while her 288,548 
slaves were, by legislative enactments, kept in a state of absolute igno- 
rance and unconditional subordination. 

Hoping, however, and believing, that a large majority of the most 
respectable and patriotic citizens of North Carolina have resolved, or 
will soon resolve, with unyielding purpose, to cast aside the great ob- 
stacle that impedes their progress, and bring into action a new policy 
which will lead them from poverty and ignorance to wealth and intel- 
lectual greatness, and which will shield them not only from the rebukes 
of their own consciences, but also from the just reproaches of the civil- 
ized world, we will, for the present, in deference to their feelings, 
forbear the further enumeration of these degrading disparities, and turn 
our attention to 

PENNSYLVANIA AND SOUTH OAEOLINA. 

An old gentleman, now residing in Charleston, told us, but a short 
wliile since, that he had a distinct recollection of the time when 
Charleston imported foreign fabrics for the Philadelphia trade, and 
when, on a certain occasion, his mother went into a store on Market 
street to select a silk dress for herself, the merchant, unable to please 
her fancy, persuaded her to postpone the selection for a few days, or 
until tiie arrival of a new stock of superb styles and fashions which he 
had recently purchased in the metropolis of South Carolina. This was 
all very proper. Charleston had a spacious harbor, a central position, 
and a mild climate ; and from priority of settlement and business connec- 
tions, to say nothing of other advantages, she enjoyed greater facilities 
for commercial transactions than Philadelphia. She had a right to get 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 



11 



custom wherever she could find it, and in securing so valuable a custo- 
mer as the Quaker Cit}', she exhibited no small degree of laudable enter- 
prise. But why did she not maintain her supremacy ? If the answer 
to this query is not already in the reader's mind, it will suggest itself 
before he peruses the whole of this work. For the present, suffice it to 
say, that the cause of her shameful insignificance and decline is essen- 
tially the same that has thrown every other southern city and State in 
the rear of progress, and rendered them tributary, in a commercial and 
manufacturing point of view, almost entirely tributary, to the more 
sagacious and enterprising States and cities of the North. 

A most unfortunate day was that for the Palmetto State, and indeed 
for the whole South, when the course of trade was changed, and she 
found herself the retailer of foreign and domestic goods, imported and 
vended by wholesale merchants at the North. Philadelphia ladies no 
longer look to the South for late fashions, and fine silks and satins ; no 
Quaker dame now wears drab apparel of Charleston importation. Like 
all other centres of trade in our disreputable part of the confederacy, 
the commercial emporium of South Carolina is sick and impoverished; 
her silver cord has been loosed ; her golden bowl has been broken ; and 
her unhappy people, without proper or profitable employment, poor in 
pocket, and few in number, go mourning or loafing about the streets. 
Her annual importations are actually less now than they were a century 
ago, when South Carolina was the second commercial province on the 
continent, Virginia being the first. 

In 1760, as we learn from Mr. Benton's "Thirty Years' View," 
the foreign imports into Charleston were $2,062,000; in 1855, they 
amounted to only $1,750,000 ! In 1854, the imports into Philadelphia, 
which, in foreign trade, ranks at present but fourth among the commer- 
cial cities of the Union, were $21,963,021. In 1850, the products of 
manufactures, mining, and the mechanic arts, in Pennsylvania, amounted 
to $155,044,910; the products of the same in South Carolina, amounted 
to only $7,063,513. 

As shown by the census report of 1850, which was prepared under 
the superintendence of a native of South CaroUna, who certainly will 
not be suspected of injustice to his own section of the country— the 
Southern States— the cash value of all the farms, farming implements, 
and machinery in Pennsylvania, was $422,598,640; the value of the 
sajne in South Carolina, in the same year, was only $86,518,038, From 
a compendium of the same census, we learn that the value of all the 
real and personal property in Pennsylvania, actual property, no slaves, 
amounted to $729,144,998 ; the value of the same in South Carolina, in- 
cluding the estimated— we were about to say fictitious— value of 384,925 
negroes, amounted to only $288,257,694. We have not been able to 
obtain the figures necessary to show the exact value of the real and per- 



12 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

sonal estate in Philadelphia, but the amount is estimated to be not less 
than $300,000,000; and as, in 1859, there were 408,762 free inhabitants 
in the single city of Philadelphia, against 283,544 of the same class in 
the whole State of South Carolina, it is quite evident that the former is 
more powerful than the latter, and far ahead of her in all the elements 
of genuine and permanent superiority. In Pennsylvania, in 1850, the 
annual income of public schools amounted to $1,348,249 ; the same in 
South Carolina, in the same year, amounted to only $200,000; in the 
former State there were 393 libraries other than private, in the latter 
only 26 ; in Pennsylvania 310 newspapers and periodicals were pub- 
lished, circulating 84,898,672 copies annually; in South Carolina only 46 
newspapers and periodicals were published, circulating but 7,145,930 
copies per annum. 

The incontrovertible facts we have thus far presented are, we think, 
amply sufficient, both in number and magnitude, to bring conviction to 
the mind of every candid reader, that there is something wrong, socially, 
politically and morally wrong, in the policy under which the South has 
so long loitered and languished. Else, how is it that the North, under 
the operations of a policy directly the opposite of ours, has surpassed 
us in almost everything great and good, and left us standing before the 
world, an object of merited reprehension and derision? 

For one, we are heartily ashamed of the inexcusable weakness, inertia 
and dilapidation everywhere so manifest throughout our native sec- 
tion ; but the blame properly attaches itself to an usurping minority 
of the people, and we are determined that it shall rest where it 
belongs. More on this subject, however, after a brief but general sur- 
vey of the inequalities and disparities that exist between those two 
grand divisions of the country, which, without reference to the situation 
that any part of their territory bears to the cardinal points, are every 
day becoming more familiarly known by the appropriate appellation of 

THE FEEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 

It is a fact well known to every intelligent Soutlierner tliat we are 
compelled to go to the North for almost every article of utility and 
adornment, from matches, shoepegs and paintings up to cotton -mills, 
steamships and statuary; that we have no foreign trade, no princely 
merchants, nor respectabie artists; that, in comparison with the free 
states, we contribute nothing to the literature, polite arts and inventions 
of the age ; that, for want of profitable employment at home, large num- 
bers of our native population find themselves necessitated to emigrate to 
the West, whilst the free states retain not only the larger proportion of 
those born within their own limits, but induce, annually, hundreds of 
thousands of foreigners to settle and remain amongst them ; that almost 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 13 

everything produced at the North meets with ready sale, while, at the 
same time, there is no demand, even among our own citizens, for the 
productions of Southern industry ; that, owing to the absence of a pro- 
per system of business amongst us, the North becomes, in one way or 
another, the proprietor and dispenser of all our floating wealth, and that 
we are dependent on Northern capitalists for the means necessary to 
build our railroads, canals and other public improvements; that if we 
want to visit a foreign country, even though it may lie directly south of 
us, we find no convenient way of getting there except by taking passage 
through a Northern port ; and that nearly all the profits arising from 
the exchange of commodities, from insurance and shipping offices, and 
from the thousand and one industrial pursuits of the country, accrue to 
the North, and are tliere invested in the erection of those magnificent 
cities and stupendous works of art which dazzle the eyes of the South, 
and attest the superiority of free institutions ! 

The North is the Mecca of our merchants, and to it they must and do 
make two pilgrimages per annum — one in the spring and one in the fall. 
All our commercial, mechanical, manufactural, and literary supplies 
come from there. We want Bibles, brooms, buckets and books, and 
we go to the North ; we want pens, ink, paper, wafers and envelopes, 
and we go to the North ; we want shoes, hats, handkerchiefs, umbrellas 
and pocket knives, and we go to the North ; we want furniture, crockery, 
glassware and pianos, and we go to the North ; we want toys, primers, 
school-books, fashionable apparel, machinery, medicines, tomb-stones, 
and a thousand other things, and we go to the North for them all. 
Instead of keeping our money in circulation at home, by patronizing our 
own mechanics, manufacturers, and laborers, we send it all away to the 
North, and there it remains ; it never falls into our hands again. 

In one way or another we are more or less subservient to the Nortli 
every day of our lives. In infancy we are swaddled in Northern muslin ; 
in childhood we are humored with Northern gewgaws ; in youth we are 
instructed out of Northern books ; at the age of maturity we sow our 
" wild oats " on Northern soil ; in middle-life we exhaust our wealth, 
energies and talents in the dishonorable vocation of entailing our depen- 
dence on our children and on our children's children, and, to the neglect 
of our own interests and the interests of those around us, in giving aid 
and succor to every department of Northern power ; in the decline of 
life we remedy our eye-sight with Northern spectacles, and support our 
infirmities with Northern canes; in old age we are drugged with 
Northern physic; and, finally, when we die, our inanimate bodies, 
shrouded in Northern cambric, are stretched upon the bier, borne to the 
grave in a Northern carriage, entombed with a Northern spade, and 
memorized with a Northern slab I 

But it can hardly be necessary to say more in illustration of t]i'> 



14 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

nnmanly and nnnational dependence, which is so glaring that it cannot 
fail to be apparent to even the most careless and superficial observer. 
All the world sees, or ought to see, that in a commercial, mechanical, 
manufactural, financial, and literary point of view, we are as helpless as 
babes; that, in comparison with the Free States, our agricultural 
resources have been greatly exaggerated, misunderstood and mis- 
managed ; and that, instead of cultivating among ourselves a wise policy, 
of mutual assistance and cooperation with respect to individuals, and 
of self-reliance with respect to the South at large, instead of giving coun- 
tenance and encouragement to the industrial enterprises projected among 
us, and instead of building up, aggrandizing and beautifying our own 
States, cities and towns, we have been spending our svibstance at the 
North, and are daily augmenting and strengthening the very power 
which now has us so completely under its thumb. 

It thus appears, in view of the preceding statistical facts and argu- 
ments, that the South, at one time the superior of the North in almost 
all the ennobling pursuits and conditions of life, has fallen far behind 
her competitor, and now ranks more as the dependency of a mother 
country than as the equal confederate of free and independent States. 
Following the order of our task, the next duty that devolves upon us is 
to trace out the causes which have conspired to bring about this impor- 
tant change, and to place on record the reasons, as we understand them, 

WHY THE NOKTH HAS StJEPASSED THE SOUTH. 

And now that we have come to the very heart and soul of our sub- 
ject, we feel no disposition to mince matters, but mean to speak plainly 
and to the point, without any equivocation, mental reservation, or secret 
evasion whatever. The son of a venerated parent, who, while he lived, 
was a considerate and merciful slaveholder, a native of the South, 
born and bred in North Carolina, of a family whose home has been in 
the valley of the Yadkin for nearly a century and a half, a Southerner 
by instinct and by all the influences of thought, habits and kindred, 
and with the desire and fixed purpose to reside permanently within the 
limits of the South, and with the expectation of dying there also — we 
feel that we have the right to express our opinion, however liumble or 
unimportant it may be, on any and everj question that affects the pub- 
lic good; and, so help us God, "sink or swim, live or die, survive or 
perish," we are determined to exercise that right with manly firmness, 
and without fear, favor or affection. 

And now to the point. In our opinion, an opinion which has been 
formed from data obtained by assiduous researches, and comparisons, 
from laborious investigation, logical reasoning, and earnest reflection, 
the causes which have impeded the progress and prosperity of the South, 
which have dwindled our commerce and other similar pursuits, into the 



FKEE AND THE SLA^TC STATES. 15 

most contemptible insignificance ; sunk a large majority of our people 
in galling poverty and ignorance, rendered a small minority conceited 
and tyrannical, and driven the rest away from their homes ; entailed 
upon us a humiliating dependence on the Free States ; disgraced us in 
the recesses of our own souls, and brought us under reproach in the 
eyes of all civilized and enlightened nations — may all be traced to one 
common source, and there find solution in the most hateful and horrible 
word, that was ever incorporated iato the vocabulary of human economy 
— Slavery. 

Eeared amidst the institution of slavery, believing it to be wrong 
both in principle and in practice, and having seen and felt its evil influ- 
ences upon individuals, communities and states, we deem it a duty, no 
less than a privilege, to enter our protest against it, and, as a Southern 
man, to use all constitutional means and our most strenuous efibrts to 
overturn and abolish it. 

Our repugnance to slavery springs from no one-sided idea, or sickly 
sentimentality. "We have not been hasty in making up our mind on 
the subject ; we have jumped at no conclusions ; we have acted with 
perfect calmness and deliberation ; we have carefully considered, and 
examined the reasons for and against the institution, and have also taken 
into account the probable consequences of our decision. The more we 
investigate the matter, the deeper becomes the conviction that we are 
right ; and with this to impel and sustain us, we pursue our labor with 
love, with hope, and -with constantly renewing vigor. 

That we shall encounter opposition we consider as certain ; perhaps 
we may even be subjected to insult and violence. From the cruel and 
conceited defenders of slavery we could look for nothing less. But we 
shall shrink from no responsibility, and do nothing unbecoming a man; 
we know how to repel indignity, and if assaulted, shall not fail to make 
the blow recoil upon the aggressor's head. The road we have to travel 
may be a rough one, but no impediment shall cause us to falter in our 
course. The line of our duty is clearly defined, and it is our intention 
to follow it faithfully, or die in the attempt. 

But, thanks to heaven, we have no ominous forebodings of the result 
of the contest now pending between Liberty and Slavery in this confeder- 
acy. Though neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, our vision is 
sufticiently penetrative to divine the future so far as to be able to see 
that the " peculiar institution " has but a short and, as heretofore, inglori- 
ous existence before it. Time, the righter of every wrong, is ripening 
events for the desired consummation of our labors and the fulfillment of 
our cherished hopes. Each revolving year brings nearer the inevitable 
crisis. The sooner it comes the better ; may lieaven, through our hum- 
ble efforts, hasten its advent. 

The first and most sacred duty of every Southerner, who has the honor 



16 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

and the interest of his country at heart, is to declare himself an unquali- 
hed and uncompromising opponent of slavery. No conditional or half- 
way declaration wiU avail; no mere threatening demonstration will 
succeed. With those who desire to he instrumental in bringing about 
the triumph of liberty over slavery, there should be neither evasion, 
vacillation, nor equivocation. "We should listen to no modifying terms 
or compromises that may be proposed by the pi'oprietors of the unprofit- 
able and ungodly institution. ISTothing short of the complete abolition 
of slavery can save the South from falling into the vortex of utter ruin. 
Too long have we yielded a submissive obedience to the tyrannical domi- 
nation of an inflated oligarchy ; too long have we tolerated their arrogance 
and self-conceit; too long have we submitted to their unjust and savage 
exactions. Let us now wrest from them the sceptre of power, estab- 
lish liberty and equal rights throughout the land, and henceforth 
and forever guard our legislative halls from the pollutions and usurpa- 
tions of pro-slavery demagogues. 

We have stated, in a cursory manner, the reasons, as we understand 
them, why the North has surpassed the South, and have endeavored to 
show, we think successfully, that the highest future welfare of the South 
can be attained only by the speedy abolition of slavery. We will not, 
however, rest the case exclusively on our own arguments, but will again 
appeal to incontrovertible facts and statistics to sustain us in our conclu- 
sions. But before we do so, we desire to fortify ourself against a charge 
that is too frequently made by careless and superficial readers. We 
allude to the objections so often urged against the use of tabular state- 
ments and statistical facts. It is worthy of note, however, that those 
objections never come from thorough scholars or profound thinkers. 
Among the majority of mankind, the science of statistics is only begin- 
ning to be appreciated ; when well understood, it will be recognized as 
one of the most important branches of knowledge, and, as a matter of 
course, be introduced and taught as an indispensable element of practical 
education in all our principal institutions of learning. One of the most 
vigorous and popular transatlantic writers of the day, Wm. C. Taylor, 
LL.D., of Dublin, says : 

" The cultivation of statistics must be the source of all future improvemeut in the 
science of political economy, because it is to the table of the statistician that the 
economist must look for his facts; and all speculations not founded upon facts, 
though they may be admired and applauded when first propounded, will, in the end, 
assuredly be forgotten. Statistical science may almost be regarded as the creation 
of this age. The word statistics was invented in the middle of the last century by 
a German professor,* to express a summary view of the physical, moral, and social 
condition of States ; he justly remarked, that a numerical statement of the extent, 
density of population, imports, exports, revenues, etc., of a country, more perfectly 
explained its social condition than general statements, however graphic or however 
accurate. When such statements began to be collected, and exhibited in a popular 
form, it was soon discovered that the political and economical sciences were likely 

♦ Achenwall, a native of Ell)i[itr, I'l-iissia. U.mi. 171 J, il.i.->l i,i>:i. 



FEEE AND THE SLATE STATES. 17 

to gain the position of ph}-sical sciences ; that is to say, they were about to obtain 
records of observation, which would test the accuracy of recognized principles, and 
lead to the discovery of new modes of action. But the great object of this new 
science is to lead to the knowledge of human nature ; that is, to ascertain the gen- 
eral course of operation of man's mental and moral faculties, and to furnish us with 
a correct standard of judgment, by enabling us to determine the average amount of 
the past as a guide to the average probabilities of the future. This science is yet in 
its infancy, but has already produced the most beneficial effects. The accuracy of 
the tables of life have rendered the calculations of rates of insurance a matter of 
much greater certainty than they were heretofore ; the system of keeping the pub- 
lic accounts has been simplified and improved ; and finally, the experimental sci- 
ences of medicine and political economy, have been fixed on a firmer foundation 
than could be anticipated in the last century. Even in private life this science is 
likely to prove of immense advantage, by directing attention to the collection and 
registration of facts, and thus preventing the formation of hasty judgments and 
erroneous conclusions." 

The compiler, or rather the superintendent of the seventh United 
States census, Prof. De Bow, a gentleman of more than ordinary indus- 
try and practical learning, who, in his excellent Eeview, has, from time 
to time, displayed much commendable zeal in his efforts to develop the 
industrial resources of the Southern and Southwestern States, and who 
is, perhaps, the greatest statistician in the country, says : 

" Statistics are far from being the barren array of figures ingeniously and labo- 
riously combined into columns and tables, which many persons are apt to suppose 
them. They constitute rather the ledger of a nation, in which, like the merchant 
in his books, the citizen can read, at one view, all of the results of a year or of a 
period of years, as compared with other periods, and deduce the profit or the loss 
which has been made, in morals, education, wealth or power." 

The present John Jay, of Few York (it is hoped that the city may 
never be without a John Jay), in a most ingenious and masterly pre- 
sentation of "The Statistics of American Agriculture," recently made 
in the form of an address before the American Geographical and Sta- 
tistical Society, says : 

"In England, the labors of the Statistical Society, whose elaborate and most 
valuable publications enrich our library, through the courtesy of the British govern- 
ment, have aroused the attention of the people and of Parliament to the truth, that 
the science of politics finds in the statistical element its most solid foundation." 

Impressed with a sense of the propriety of introducing, in this as 
well as in the succeeding chapters of our work, a number of tabular 
statements exhibiting the comparative growth and prosperity of the 
free and slave States, we have deemed it eminently proper to adduce 
the testimony of these distinguished authors in support of the claims 
which official facts and accurate statistics lay to our consideration. 
And here we may remark, that the statistics which we propose to offer, 
like those already given, have been obtained from official sources, and 
may, therefore, be relied on as correct. The object we have in view 
m making a free use of facts and figures, if not already apparent, will 
soon be understood. It is not so much in its moral and religious 
aspects that we propose to discuss the question of slavery, as in it« 



18 COMPAKISONS BETWEEN THE 

oDcial and political character and influences. To say nothing of tlie sit 
and the shame of slavery, we helieve it is a most expensive and unprofit- 
able institution ; and if our brethren of the South will but throw aside 
their unfounded prejudices and preconceived opinions, and give us a 
fair and patient hearing, we feel confident that we can bring them to 
the same conclusion. Indeed, we believe we shall be enabled — not alone 
by our own contributions, but with the aid of incontestable facts and 
arguments which we shall inti-oduce from other sources — to convince 
all true-hearted, candid and intelligent Southerners, who may chance to 
read our book (and we hope their name may be legion), that slavery, 
and nothing but slavery, has retarded the progress and prosperity of 
onr portion of the Union ; depopulated and impoverished our cities by 
forcing the more industrious and enterprising natives of the soil to emi- 
grate to the free States ; brought our domain under a sparse and inert 
population by preventing foreign immigration ; made us tributary to the 
North, and reduced us to the humiliating condition of mere provincial 
subjects in fact, though not in name. "We believe, moreover, that every 
patriotic Southerner thus convinced will feel it a duty he owes to him- 
self, to his country, and to his God, to become a thorough, inflexible, 
practical Abolitionist. So mote it be ! 

Now to our figures. Few persons have an adequate idea of the im- 
portant part the cardinal numbers are now playing in the cause of 
liberty. They are working wonders in the South. Intelligent business 
men, from the Chesapeake to the Rio Grande, are beginning to see that 
slavery, even in a mercenary point of view, is impolitic, because it is 
unprofitable. Those unique, mysterious little Arabic sentinels on the 
watch-towers of political economy, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0, have joined 
forces, allied themselves to the powers of freedom, and are hemming in 
and combating slavery with the most signal success. If let alone, we 
have no doubt the digits themselves would soon terminate the existence 
of human slavery ; but we do not mean to let them alone ; they must 
not have all the honor of annihilating the monstrous iniquity. "We want 
to become an auxiliary in the good work, and facilitate it. The libera- 
tion of six millions of non-slaveholding whites from the second degree 
of slavery, and of three millions of miserable kidnapped negroes from 
the first degree, cannot be accomplished too soon. That it was not ac- 
complished many years ago is our misfortune. It now behooves us to 
take a bold and determined stand in defence of the alienable rights of 
ourselves and of our fellow men, and to avenge the multiplicity of 
wrongs, social and political, which we have suffered at the hands of a 
most selfish and domineering oligarchy. It is madness to delay. "We 
cannot be too hasty in carrying out our designs. Precipitance in this 
inattcf is an utter impossibility. Now is the time for action ; let us 
work. 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 19 

By taking a sort of inventory of the agricultural products of the free 
and slave States in 1850, we now propose to correct a most extraordi- 
nary and mischievous error into which the people of the South have 
unconsciously fallen. Agriculture, it is well known, is the sole boast of 
the South ; and, strange to say, many pro-slavery Southerners who, in 
our latitude, pass for intelligent men, are so puffed up with the idea of 
our importance in this respect, that they speak of the North as a sterile 
region, unfit for cultivation, and quite dependent on the South for the 
necessaries of life ! Such gross, rampant ignorance deserves no audience. 
AVe can prove that the North produces greater quantities of breadstuffs 
than the South. Figures shall show the facts. Properly, the South has 
nothing left to boast of; the North has surpassed her in everything, 
and is going further and further ahead of her every day. "We ask the 
reader's careful attention to the following tables, which we have pre- 
pared at no little cost of time and trouble, and which, when duly con- 
sidered in connection with the foregoing and subsequent portions of our 
work, will, we believe, carry conviction to the mind that the down- 
ward tendency of the South can be arrested only by the abolition of 
slavery. 



I 



20 



COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 



T.AJBLE 1. 

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES — 1850. 



California 

Connecticut . . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Blassachusetts.. 

Michigan 

New Hampshire. 
New Jersey. . . 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania. . . 
Rhode Island. . . 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 



Wheat, 

busliels. 



17,228 

41,762 

9,414,575 

6,214,453 

1,530,531 

296,259 

31,211 

4,925,889 

185,658 

1,601,190 

13,121,493 

14,487,351 

15,367,691 

49 

535,955 

4,286,131 



Oats, 
bushels. 



] Indian rorn, 
bushels. 



1,258,733 i 
10,087,241 
5,655,014 
1,524,345 
2,181,037 
1,16.5,146 
2,866,056 
973,381 
3,378,063 
26,552,814 
13,472,742 
21,538.156 
215,282 
2,307,734 
3,414,672 



12,236 

1,935,043 

57,646,934 

52,964,36:3 

8,656,799 

1,750,056 

2,345,490 

5,641,420 

1,573,670 

8,759,704 

17,858,400 

59,078,695 

19,835,214 

539,201 

2,032,396 

1,983,979 



72,157,486 |96,590,371 242,613,650 59,033,170 



Pot.itoes, 
(1. and S.) 
bushels. 



10,292 
2,689,805 
2,672.294 
2,285,048 

282,363 
8,436,040 
3,535,384 
2,361,074 
4,807,in9 
3,715,251 
15,408,997 
5,245,760 
6,082,904 

651,029 
4,951,014 
1,402,956 



Rye, 
bushels. 



600,893 

83,364 

78,792 

19,916 

102,916 

481,021 

105,871 

183,117 

1,255,578 

4,14^182 

425,918 

4,805,160 

26,409 

176,233 

81,253 



12,574,623 



AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES — 1S50. 



Alabama .. 294,044 

Arkansas 199,689 

Delaware 482,511 

Florida 1,027 

Georgia 1,088,534 

Kentucky 2,142,822 

Louisiana 417 

Maryland 4,494,680 

Mississippi 137,990 

Missouri ' 2,981,652 

North Carolina ! 2,130,102 

South Carolina I 1,066,277 

Tennessee I 1,619,386 

Texas 41,729 

Virginia 11,212,616 



Oats, 
bushels. 



2,965,696 

656,183 

604,513 

66,586 

3,820,044 

8,201,311 

89,637 

2,242,151 

1.503,288 

5,278,079 

4,052,078 

2,322,155 

7,703,086 

199,017 

10,179,144 



Indian Corn, 
bushels. 



28,754,048 

8,893,989 

8,145,542 

1,996,809 

80,030,099 

53,672,591 

10,266,373 

10,749,858 

22,446,552 

36,214,537 

27,941,0.51 

16,271,454 

52,276,223 

6,028,876 

35,254,319 



Potatoes, 
(I. and S.; 
bushels. 



5,721,205 

981,931 

805,985 

765,054 

7,213,807 

2,490,666 

1,524,085 

978,932 

5,008 277 

1,274,511 

5,716,027 

4,473,960 

3,845,500 

1,426,803 

3,130,567 



, 27,904,476 49,882,979 348,992,282 44,847,420 



Rye, 

bushels. 



17,261 

8,047 

8,066 

1,152 

53,760 

415,078 

475 

226,014 

9,606 

44.268 

229,563 

43,790 

89,137 

3,108 

458,980 I 

1,608,240 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 



21 



TJsJBH.lEl 3. 

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES — 1850. 



STATE.S. 


Biickwlieat, 
busliels. 


Beans & Peas, 
bushels. 


floT. & Grass 
Seeds, bush. 


Flaxseed, 
bushels. 


Value of Gar- 
den Products. 


Value of Or- 
chard Prod'ts. 


California 

Connecticut. . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massachusetts 
Michigan . . . 
N. Hampshire^. 
New Jersey . .*. 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania. 
Rhode Island.. 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 


229,297 
184,509 
149,740 

52,516 
104,523 
105,895 
472,917 

65,265 

878,9;^ 

3,183,955 

638,060 

2,193,692 

1,245 

209,619 

79,878 


2,292 

19,090 

82,814 

35,773 

4,475 

205,541 
43,7u9 
74,254 
70,856 
14,174 

741,546 

60,168 

55,231 

6,846 

104,ft49 
20,657 


80,469 
17,807 
30,271 

2,438 
18,311 

6,087 
26,274 

8,900 

91,331 

184,715 

140,501 

178,943 

6,036 
15,696 

5,486 


703 

10,787 

36,888 

1,959 

580 

72 

519 

1S9 

16,525 

57,963 

188,880 

41,728 

""939 
1,191 


$75,275 

196,874 

127,494 

72,864 

8,848 

122,.387 

600,020 

14,738 

56,810 

475,242 

912,047 

214,004 

688,714 

98,298 

18,858 

32,142 


$17,700 

175,118 

446,049 

324,940 

8,484 

842,865 

463,995 

132,650 

248,560 

607,268 

1,761,950 

695,921 

723,389 

63,994 

315,255 

4,823 




8,550,245 


1,542,295 


762,266 


358,923 


$3,714,605 


$6,882,914 



AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OP THE SLAVE STATES — 1850. 



STATES. 


Buckwhe.it, 
bu.shels. 


Beans & Peas, 
bushels. 


Clov. & Grass 
Seeds, bush. 


Flaxseed, 
bushels. 


Value of Gar- 
den Products. 


Value of Or- 
chard Prod'ts. 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky .... 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi .... 

Missouri 

N. Carolina.. . 
S, Carolina . . . 
Tennessee .... 

Texas 

Virginia 


848 

175 

8,615 

56 

250 

16,097 

3 

103,671 

1,121 

23,641 

16,704 

283 

19,427 

59 

214,898 


892,701 

286,738 

4,120 

185,359 

1,142,011 
202,574 
161,7.32 
12,816 

1,072,757 
46,017 

1,584,252 

1,026,900 
869,-321 
179,3.51 
521,579 


685 

526 

8,928 

2 

560 

24,711 

99 

17,778 

617 

4,965 

1,851 

406 

14,214 

10 

53,155 


69 
321 
904 

'"'622 
75,801 

2,446 
26 

13,696 

88,196 
55 

18,904 
26 

52,818 


$84,821 

17,150 

12,714 

8,721 

76,500 

803,120 

148,329 

200,869 

46,250 

99,454 

89,462 

47,286 

97,183 

12,354 

183,047 


$15,408 

40,141 

46,574 

1,2S0 

92,776 

106,230 
22,259 

164,051 
50,405 

514,711 
84,343 
ai,108 
52,894 
12,505 

177,137 




405,857 


7,687,227 


128,517 203,484 


$1,877,260 1 $1,355,827 



22 COMPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 



EEOAPITULATIOI?' — FEEE STATES. 

Wheat 72,157,486 bushels @ 150 $108,236,229 

Oata 96,590.371 " " 40 38,636,148 

Indian Corn 242,618,650 " " 60 145,571,190 

Potatoes (I. & S.) 59,033,170 " " 38 22,432,604 

Rye 12,574,623 " " 100 12,574,623 

Barley 5,002,013 " " 90 4,501,811 

Buckwheat 8,550,245 " " 50 4,275,122 

Beans and Peas 1,542,295 " " 175 2,699,015 

Clover and Grass Seeds... 762,265 " " 3 00 2,286,795 

Flaxseeds 358,923 " " 125 448,647 

Garden Products 3,714,605 

Orchard Products 6,332,914 



Total 499,190,041 bushels, valued as above, at . . $351,709,703 

EEOAPITULATIOJT — SLATE STATES. 

Wheat 27,904,476 bushels @ 150 $41,856,714 

Oats 49,882,799 " " 40 19,953,191 

Indian Corn 348,992,282 " " 60 209,395,369 

Potatoes (I. & S.) 44,847,420 " " 38 17,042,019 

Rye 1,608,240 " " 100 1,608,240 

Barley 161,907 " " 90 145,716 

Buckwheat 405,357 " '• 50 202,678 

Beans aud Peas 7,637,227 " " 175 13,305,147 

Clover and Grass Seeds... 123,517 " " 3 00 370,551 

Flaxseeds 203,484 " " 125 254.355 

Garden Products 1,377,260 

Orchard Products 1,355,827 



. Total 481,766,889 bushels, valued as above, at. . $306,927,067 

TOTAL DIFFEEEXOE — BUSHEL-MEASUEE PEODXJCTS. 

Bushels. Value. 

Free States 499,190,041 $351,709,703 

Slave States 481,766,889 306,927,067 



Balance in bushels 17,423,152 Difference in value $44,782,63G 

So mucli for the boasted agricultural superiority of the South ! Mark 
well the balance in bushels, and the difference in value ! Is either in 
favor of the South ? No 1 Are both in favor of the North ? Yes ! 
Here we have unquestionable proof tliat of all the biashel-measure pr.i- 
ducts of the nation, the free States produce far more than one-half ; ami 
it is worthy of particular mention, that the excess of NortTiern products 
is of the most valuable hind. The account shows a balance against the 
South, in favor of the North, of seventeen million four hundred and 
twenty-three thousand one hundred and fifty -two hushels, and a difference 
in value oi forty -four million seven hundred and eighty -two thousand nix 
hundred and thirty-six dollars. , Please bear these facts in mind, for, in 
order to show positively how the free and slave States do stand upon the 
great and important subject of rural economy, we intend to take an ac- 
count of all the other products of the soil, of the live-stock upon farms, 
of the animals slaughtered, and, in fact, of every item of husbandry of 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 23 

the two sections ; and if, in bringing our tabular exercises to a close, we 
find slavery gaining upon freedom — a thing it has never yet been known 
to do — we shall, as a matter of course, see that the above amount is 
transferred to the credit of the side to which it of right belongs. 

In making up these tables we have two objects in view ; the first is to 
open the eyes of the non-slaveholders of the South, to the system of de- 
ception, that has been so long practised upon them, and the second is to 
show slaveholders themselves — we have reference only to those who are 
not too perverse, or ignorant, to perceive naked truths — that free labor 
is far more respectable, profitable, and productive, than slave labor. In 
the South, unfortunately, no kind of labor is either free or respectable. 
Every white man who is under the necessity of earning his bread, by 
the sweat of his brow, or by manual labor, in any capacity, no matter 
how unassuming in deportment, or exemplary in morals, is treated as if 
he were a loathsome beast, and shunned with disdain. His soul maybe 
the very seat of honor and integrity, yet without slaves — himself a slave 
— he is accounted as nobody, and would be deemed intolerably presump- 
tuous, if he dared to open his mouth, even so wide as to give faint utter- 
ance to a three-lettered monosyllable, like yea or nay, in the presence 
of an august knight of the whip and the lash. 

There are few Southerners who will not be astonished at the disclo- 
sures of these statistical comparisons, between the free and the slave 
States. That the astonishment of the more intelligent and patriotic 
non-slaveholders will be mingled with indignation, is no more than we 
anticipate. We confess our own surprise, and deep chagrin, at the result 
of our investigations. Until we examined into the matter, we thought 
and hoped the South was really ahead of the North in one particular, 
that of agriculture ; but our thoughts have been changed, and our hopes 
frustrated, for instead of finding ourselves the possessors of a single ad- 
vantage, we behold our dear native South stripped of every laurel, and 
sinking deeper and deeper in the depths of poverty and shame ; while, 
at the same time, we see the North, our successful rival, extracting and 
absorbing the few elements' of wealth yet remaining among us, and 
rising higher and higher in the scale of fame, fortune, and invulnerable 
power. Thus our disappointment gives way to a feeling of intense 
mortification, and our soul involuntarily, but justly, we believe, cries 
out for retribution against the treacherous slaveholding legislators, who 
have so basely and unpatriotically neglected the interests of their poor 
white constituents and bargained away the rights of posterity. Notwith- 
standing the fact that the white non-slaveholders of the South are in the 
majority, as six to one, they have never yet had any uncontrolled part 
or lot in framing the laws under which they live. There is no legisla- 
tion except for the benefit of slavery, and slaveholders. As a general 
rule, poor white persons are regarded with less esteem and attention 



2i OOMPAKISONS BETWEEN THE 

than negroes, axid though the condition of the latter is wretched beyond 
description, vast numbers of the former are infinitely worse off. • A cun- 
ningly devised mockery of freedom is guaranteed to them, and that is all. 
To all intents and purposes they are disfranchised, and outlawed, and the 
only privilege extended to them, is a shallow and circumscribed partici- 
pation in the political movements that usher slaveholders into office. 

We have not breathed away nine and twenty years in the South, 
without becoming acquainted with the demagogical manffiuverings of the 
oligarchy. Their intrigues and tricks of legerdemain are as familiar to 
us as household words ; in vain might the world be ransacked for a more 
precious junto of flatterers and cajolers. It is amusing to ignorance, 
amazing to credulity, and insulting to intelligence, to hear them in their 
blustering efforts to mystify and pervert the sacred principles of liberty, 
and turn the curse of slavery into a blessing. To the illiterate poor 
whites — made poor and ignorant by the system of slavery — they 
hold out the idea that slavery is the very bulwark of our liberties, 
and the foundation of American independence ! For hours at a 
time, day after day, will they expatiate upon the inexpressible beauties 
and excellences of this great free and independent nation ; and finally 
with the most extravagant gesticulations and rhetorical flourishes, con- 
clude their nonsensical ravings, by attributing all the glory and pro- 
sperity of the country, from Maine to Texas, and from Georgia to Cali- 
fornia, to the "invaluable institutions of the South!" On the part of 
the intelligent listener, who cherishes a high regard for truth and jus- 
tice, it requires no small degree of patience and forbearance to rest 
quietly under the incoherent, truth-murdering declamations of these 
subtle-tongued champions of slavery. 

The lords of the lash are not only absolute masters of the blacks, who 
are bought and sold, and driven about like so many cattle, but they are 
also the oracles and arbiters of all non-slaveholding whites, whose free- 
dom is merely nominal, and whose unparalleled illiteracy and degrada- 
tion is purposely and fiendishly perpetuated. How little the " poor 
wliite trash," the great majority of the Southern people, know of the 
real condition of the country, is, indeed, sadly astonishing. The truth is, 
they know nothing of public measures, and little of private affairs, except 
what their imperious masters, the slave-drivers, condescend to tell, and 
that is but precious little, and even that little, always garbled and one- 
sided, is never told except in public harangues ; for the haughty cava- 
liers of shackles and handcuff's will not degrade themselves by holding 
private converse with those who have neither dimes nor hereditary 
rights in human flesh. 

Whenever it pleases, and to the extent it pleases, a slaveholder to 
become communicative, poor whites may hear with fear and trembling, 
but not speak. They must be as mum as dumb brutes, and stand in awe 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 25 

of their august superiors, or be crushed with stern rebukes, cruel 
oppressions, or downright violence. If they dare to think for them- 
selves, their thoughts must be forever concealed. The expression of 
any sentiment at all conflicting with the gospel of slavery, dooms them 
at once in the community in which they live, and then, whether willing 
or unwilling, they are obliged to become heroes, martyrs, or exiles. 
They may thirst for knowledge, but there is no Moses among tliem to 
smite it out of the rocks of Iloreb. The black veil, tlu-ough whoso 
almost impenetrable meshes light seldom gleams, has long been pendant 
over their eyes, and there, with fiendish jealousy, slaveholding officials 
sedulously guj^rd it. Non-slaveholders are not only kept in ignorance 
of what is transpiring at the North, but they are continually mis- 
informed of what is going on even in the South. Never were the 
poorer classes of a people, and those classes so largely in the majority, 
and all inhabiting the same country, so basely duped, so adroitly swindled 
or so unpardonably outraged. 

It is expected that the stupid and sequacious masses, the white victims 
of slavery, will believe, and, as a general thing, they do believe, what- 
ever the slaveholders tell them ; and thus it is that they are cajoled 
into the notion that they are the freest, happiest, and most intelligent 
people in the world, and are taught to look witli prejudice and disap-v 
probation upon every new principle or progressive movement. Thus it is, 
that the South, woefully inert and inventionless, has lagged behind the 
North, and is now weltering in the cesspool of ignorance and degradation. 
We have already intimated that the opinion is prevalent throughout 
the South that the free States are quite sterile and unproductive, and 
that they are mainly dependent on us for breadstuffs and other provi- 
sions. So far astlic cereals, fruits, garden vegetables and esculent roots 
are concerned, we have, in the preceding tables, shown the utter falsity 
of tliis opinion ; and we now propose to show that it is equally erro- 
neous in other particulars, and very far from the truth in the general 
reckoning. We can prove, and we intend to prove, from facts in our pos- 
session, tliat the hay crop of the free States is worth considerably more 
in dollars and cents than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp 
produced in the fifteen slave States. This statement may strike some of 
our readers with amazement, and others may, for the moment, regard it 
as quite incredible ; but it is true, nevertheless, and we shall soon pro- 
ceed to confirm it. The single free State of New York produces more 
than three times the quantity of hay that is produced in all the slave 
States. Ohio produces a larger number of tons than all the Southern 
and Southwestern States, and so does Pennsylvania. Vermont, little 
and unpretending as she is, does the same thing, with the exception of 
Virginia. Look at the facts as presented in the tables, and le<. your 
own eyes, physical and intellectual, confirm you in the trutli. 

2 



20 COMPAKISONS BETWEEN THE 

And yet, forsooth, the slaveholding oligarchy would whip us into the 
belief that agriculture is not one of the leading and lucrative pursuits 
of the free States, that the soil there is an uninterrupted barren waste, 
and that our Northern brethren, having the advantage in nothing except 
wealth, population, inland and foreign commerce, manufactures, mechan- 
ism, inventions, literature, the arts and sciences, and their concomitant 
branches of profitable industry — miserable objects of charity ! — are de- 
I'endent on us for the necessaries of life. 

Next to Virginia, Maryland is the greatest Southern hay-producing 
State ; and yet, it is the opinion of several of the most extensive hay 
and grain dealers in Baltimore, with whom we have conversed on the 
subject, that the domestic crop is scarcely equal to one-third|the demand, 
and that the balance required for home consumption, about two-thirds, 
is chiefly brouglit from New York, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. 
At this rate, Maryland receives and consumes not less than three hun- 
dred and fifteen thousand tons of Northern hay every year; and this, 
as we are informed by the dealers above-mentioned, at an average cost 
to the last purchaser, by the time it is stowed in the mow, of at least 
twenty-five dollars per ton ; it would thus appear that this most popular 
and valuable provender, one of the staple commodities of the North, 
commands a market in a single slave State, to the amount of seven mil- 
lion eight hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars per annum. 

In this same State of Maryland, less than one million of dollars' worth 
of cotton finds a market, the whole number of bales sold here in 1850 
amounting to only twenty-three thousand three hundred and twenty- 
five, valued at seven hundred and forty-six thousand four hundred 
dollars. Briefly, then, and in round numbers, we may state the case 
thus : Maryland buys annually seven millions of dollars' worth of hay 
from the North, and one million of dollars' worth of cotton from the 
South. Let slaveholders and their fawning defenders read, ponder and 
compare. 

The exact quantities of Nortliern hay, rye, and buckwheat flour, Irish 
potatoes, fruits, clover and grass seeds, and other products of the soil, 
received and consumed in all the slaveholding States, we have no means 
of ascertaining ; but for all practical purposes, we can arrive sufficiently 
near to the amount by inference from the above data, and from 
what we see with our eyes and hear with our ears wherever we go. 
Food from the North for man or for beast, or for both, is for sale in 
every market in the South. Even in the most insignificant little villages 
in the interior of the slave States, where books, newspapers and other 
mediums of intelligence are unknown, where the poor whites and the 
negroes arc alike bowed down in heathenish ignorance and barbarism, 
and where the news is received but once a week, and then only in a 
Northern-built stage-coach, drawn by horses in Northern harness, in 



^ FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 27 

cluirgc of a driver dressed ca2)-a-2n6 in Northern habiliments, and with 
a Nortliern whip in his hand — the agricnltural products of the North, 
eitlier crude, prepared, pickled or preserved, are ever to be found. 

JSIortifying as the acknowledgment of the fact is to us, it is our un- 
biased opinion — an opinion w'hich will, we believe, be indorsed by every 
intelligent person who goes into a careful examination and comparison 
of all the facts in the case — that the profits arising to the North from 
the sale of provender and provisions to the South, are far greater than 
those arising to the South from the sale of cotton, tobacco and bread- 
stutf-i to the North. It follows, then, that the agricultural interests of 
the xNorth being not only equal but actually superior to those of the 
South, the hundreds of millions of dollars which the commerce and 
manufactures of the former annually yield, is just so nmch clear and 
independent gain over the latter. It follows, also, from a corresponding 
train or system of deduction, and with all the foregoing facts in view, 
that the difference between freedom and slavery is simply the difference 
between sense and nonsense, wisdom and folly, good and evil, right and 
wrong. 

Any observant American, from whatever point of the compass he 
may hail, who will take the trouble to pass though the Southern mar- 
kets, both great and small, as we have done, and inquire where this 
article, that and the other came from, will be utterly astonished at the 
variety and quantity of Northern agricultural productions kept for sale. 
And this state of things is growing worse and worse every year. Ex- 
clusively agricultural as the South is in her industrial pursuits, she is 
barely able to support her sparse and degenerate population. Her men 
and her domestic' animals, both dwarfed into shabby objects of com- 
miseration under the blighting effects of slavery, are constantly feeding 
on the multifarious products of Northern soil. And if the whole truth 
must be told, v.-e may here add, that these products, like all other arti- 
cles of merchandise purchased at the North, are generally bought on 
credit, and, in a great number of instances, by far too many, never paid 
for — not, as a general rule, because the purchasers are dishonest or un- 
willing to pay, but because they are impoverished and depressed by the 
retrogressive and deadening operations of slavery, that most unprofit- 
able and pernicious institution under which they live. 

To show how well we are sustained in our remarks on hay and other 
special products of the soil, as well as to give circulation to other facts 
of equal significance, we quote a single passage from an address by Paul 
C. Cameron, before the Agricultural Society of Orange County, North 
Carolina. This production is, in the main, so powerfully conceived, so 
correct and plausible in its statements and conclusions, and so well cal- 
culated, though, perhaps, not intended, to arouse the old North State to 
a sense of her natural greatness and acquired shame, that we could wish 



28 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

to see it published in pamphlet form, and circulated throughout the 
length and breadth of that unfortunate and degraded heritage of slavery. 
Mr. Cameron says : 

" I know not when I have been more humiliated, as a North C;irolina farmer, 
than when, a few weeks ago, at a railroad depot at the very doors of our State 
capital, I saw wagons drawn by Kentucky mules, loading with Northern hay, for 
the supply not only of the town, but to be taken to the country. Such a sight at the 
capital of a State whose population is almost exclusively devoted to agriculture, is 
a most humiliating exhibition. Let us cease to use everything, as far as it is prac- 
ticable, that is not the product of our own soil and workshops — not an axe, or a 
broom, or bucket, from Connecticut. By every consideration of self-preservation, 
we are called to make better efforts to expel the Northern grocer from the State 
with his butter, and the Ohio and Kentucky horse, mule and hog driver, from our 
county at least. It is a reproach on us as farmers, and no little deduction from 
our wealth, that we suffer the population of our towns and villages to supply them- 
selves with butter from another Orange County in New York." 

"We have promised to prove that the hay crop of the free States is 
VForth considerably more than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp 
produced in the fifteen slave States. The compilers of the last census, 
as we learn from Prof. De Bow, the able and courteous superintendent, 
in making up the hay-tables, allowed two thousand two hundred and 
forty pounds to the ton. The price per ton at which we should estimate 
its value has puzzled us to some extent. Dealers in the article at Balti- 
more think it will average twenty-five dollars, in their market. Four 
or five mouths ago they sold it at thirty dollars per ton. At the very 
time we write, though there is less activity in the article than usual, we 
learn, from an examination of sundry prices-current and commercial 
journals, that hay is selling in Savannah at $33 per ton ; in Mobile and 
New Orleans at $26; in Charleston at $25; in Louisville at $24; and 
in Cincinnati at $23. The average of these prices is twenty-six dollars 
sixteen and ttco-third cents ; and we suppose it would be fair to employ 
the figures which would indicate this amount, the net value of a single 
ton, in calculating the total market value of the entire crop. Were we 
to do this — and, with the foregoing facts in view, we submit to intelli- 
gent men whether we would not be justifiable in doing it — the hay crop 
of the free States, 12,690,982 tons, in 1850, would amount in valuation 
to the enormous sum of $331,081,695 — more than four times the value 
of all the cotton produced in the United States during the same period ! 

But we shall not make the calculation at what we have found to be 
the average value per ton throughout the country. What rate, then, 
shall be agreed upon as a basis of comparison between the value of the 
hay crop of the North and that of the South, and as a means of testing 
the truth of our declaration — that the former exceeds the aggregate 
value of all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp produced in the fif- 
teen slave States? Suppose we take $13 08 J— just half the average 
value — as the multiplier in this arithmetical exercise. This we can well 
afi'ond to do; indeed, we might reduce the amount per ton to much lesa 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 29 

than half the average vahie, and still have a large margin left for tri- 
umphant demonstration. It is not our purpose, however, to make an 
overwhelming display of the incomparable greatness of the free States. 

In estimating the value of the various agricultural products of the two 
great sections of the country, we have been guided by prices emanating 
from the Bureau of Agriculture in AYasliington ; and in a catalogue of 
those prices now before us, we perceive that the average value of hay 
throughout the nation is supposed to be not more than half a cent per 
pound — $11 20 per ton — which, as we have seen above, is considerably 
less than half the present market value; — and this, too, in the face of the 
fact that prices generally rule higher than they do just now. It will be 
admitted on all sides, however, that the prices fixed upon by the Bureau 
of Agriculture, taken as a whole, are as fair for one section of the country 
as for the other, and that we cannot blamelessly deviate from them in 
one particular without deviating from them in another. Eleven dollars 
and twenty cents ($11 20) per ton shall therefore be the price; and, not- 
withstanding these greatly reduced figures, we now renew, with an 
addendum, our declaration and promise, that — We can prove, and wo shall 
now 2^roceed to prove, that the annual My crop of the free States is Korth 
considerably more in dollars and cents than all the cotton, tolacco, rice, 
hay, hemp, and cane sugar annually produced in the fifteen slave States. 

HAY CROP OF THE FREE STATES 1850. 

12,690,982 tons fe $11 20 $142,138,998 

SUNDRY PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES— 1850, 

Cotton 2.445,779 bales® $32 GO $78,264,928 

Tobacco 185,023.906 lbs. " 10 18,502,390 

Eice (rough) 215,313,407 lbs. " 4 8,612,539 

Hay 1,137,784 tons " 11 20 12,743,180 

Hemp 34,673 tons " 112 00 3,883,376 

CaneSugar 237,133,000 lbs. " 7 16,599,310 



Total.... $138,605,723 



RECAPITULATION, 



Hay crop of the free States $142,138,908 

Sundry products of the slave States 138,605,723 

Balance in favor of the free States $3,533,275 

There is the account ; look at it, and let it stand in attestation of the 
exalted virtues and surpassing powers of freedom. Scan it well. Mes- 
sieurs lords of the lash, and learn from it new lessons of the utter ineffi- 
ciency, and despicable imbecility of slavery. Examine it minutely, 
liberty-loving patriots of the North, and behold in it additional evidences 
of the beauty, grandeur, and superexcellence of free institutions. Trea- 
sure it up in your minds, outraged friends and non -slaveholders of the 



30 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

South, and let the recollection of it arouse you to an inflexible determi- 
nation to extirpate the monstrous enemy that stalks abroad in your 
land, and to recover the inalienable rights and liberties, which have been 
filched from you by an unscrupulous oligarchy. 

In deference to truth, decency and good sense, it is to be hoped that 
the enemies of free institutions will never more have the effrontery to 
open their mouths in extolling the agricultural achievements of slave 
labor. Especially is it desirable, that, as a simple act of justice to a 
grossly deceived populace, they may cease their stale and senseless 
harangues on the importance of cotton. The value of cotton to the 
South, to the North, to the nation, and to the world, has been so grossly 
exaggerated, and so extensive have been the evils which have resulted in 
consequence of the extraordinary misrepresentations concerning it, that 
we should feel constrained to reproach ourself for remissness of duty, if 
we failed to make an attempt to explode the popular error. The figures 
above shov/ what it is, and what it is not. Eecur to them, and learn the 
facts. 

So hyperbolically has the importance of cotton been magnified by cer- 
tain pro-slavery politicians of the South, that the person who would 
give credence to all their fustian and bombast, would be under tlie 
necessity of believing that the very existence of almost everything, in 
the heaven above, in the earth beneath, and in the water under the 
earth, depended on it. The truth is, however, that the cotton crop is of 
but comparatively little value to the South. New England and Old 
England, by their superior enterprise and sagacity, turn it chiefly to 
their own advantage. It is carried in their ships, spun in their factories, 
woven in their looms, insured in their offices, returned again in their 
own vessels, and, with double freight and cost of manufacturing added, 
imrcliased by the South at a liigh premium. Of all tlie parties engaged 
or interested in its transportation and manufacture, the South is the 
only one that does not make a profit. Nor does she, as a general thing, 
make a decent profit by producing it. 

We are credibly informed that many of the farmers in tlie immediate 
vicinity of Baltimore, where Ave now write, have turned their attention 
exclusively to hay, and that from one acre they frequently gather two 
tons, for which they receive fifty dollars. Let us now inquire how 
many dollars may be expected from an acre planted in cotton. Mr. 
Cameron, from wliose able address before the Agricultural Society of 
Orange County, North Carolina, we have already gleaned some interest- 
ing particulars, informs us, that the cotton planters in his part of the 
country, " liave contented themselves with a crop yielding only ten or 
twelve dollars per acre,'' and that " the summing up of a large surface 
gives but a living result." An intelligent resident of the Palmetto 
Sfate, writing in l)c Bow's Review, not long since, advances the opinion 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 31 

that the cotton planters of South Carolina are not realizing more than 
one per cent, on the amount of capital they have invested. While in 
Virginia, very recently, an elderly slaveholder, whose religious walk 
and conversation had recommended and promoted him to an eldership 
in the Presbyterian church, and who supports himself and family by 
raising negroes and tobacco, told us that, for the last eight or ten years, 
aside from the increase of his human chattels, he felt quite confident Tie 
had not cleared as much even as one per cent, per annum on the amount 
of his investment. The real and personal property of this aged Christian 
consists chiefly in a large tract of land and about thirty negroes, most 
of whom, according to his own confession, are more expensive than 
profitable. The proceeds arising from the sale of the tobacco they produce, 
are all absorbed in the purchase of meat and bread for home consump- 
tion, and when the crop is stunted by drought, frost, or otherwise cut 
short, one of the negroes must be sold to raise funds for the support of 
tlie others. Such are the agricultural achievements of slave labor ; such 
are the results of " the sum of all villainies." The diabolical institution 
subsists on its own flesh. At one time children are sold to procure food 
for the parents, at another, parents are sold to procure food for the 
children. Within its pestilential atmosphere, nothing succeeds ; pro- 
gress and prosperity are unknown ; inanition and slothfulness ensue ; 
everything becomes dull, dismal and unprofitable ; wretchedness and 
desolation stand or lie in bold relief througliout the land ; an aspect of 
most melancholy inactivity and dilapidation broods over every city and 
town; ignorance and prejudice sit enthroned over the minds of the peo- 
ple; usurping despots wield the sceptre of power; everywhere, and in 
everything, between Delaware Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, are tlie 
multitudinous evils of slavery apparent. 

The soil itself soon sickens and dies beneath the unnatural tread of 
the slave. Hear what the Hon. 0. C. Clay, of Alabama, has to say upon 
the subject. His testimony is eminently suggestive, well-timed, and 
truthful ; and we heartily commend it to the careful consideration of 
every spirited Southron who loves his country, and desires to see it 
rescued from the fatal grasp of " the mother of harlots." Says he : 

" I can show you, witli sorrow, in the older portions of Alabama, and in my 
native county of Madison, the sad memorials of the artless and exhausting culture 
of cotton. Our small planters, after taking the cream off their lands, unable to res- 
tore them by rest, manures, or otherwise, are going further West and South, in 
search of other virgin 'ands, which they may and will despoil and impoverish in 
like manner. Our wealthier planters, with greater means and uo more skill, are 
bu3-ing out their poorer neighbors, extending their plantations, and adding to their 
slave force. The wealthy few, who are able to live on smaller profits, and to give 
their blasted fields some "rest, are thus pushing off the many who are merely inde- 
pendent. Of the $20,000,000 annually realized from the sales of the cotton crop 
of Alabama, nearly all not expended in supporting the producers, is re-invested in 
land and negroes. Thus the white population has decreased and the slave increased 
almost pari passit in several counties of our State. In 1825, Madison county cast 
about 3,000 votes ; now, she cannot cast exceeding 2,300. In traversing that 



32 COilPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

count}-, one will discover numerous farm-houses, once the abode of industrious and 
intelligent freemen, now occupied by slaves, or tenautless, deserted and dilapi- 
dated ; he will observe fields, once fertile, now unfenced, abandoned and covered 
with those evil harbingers, fox-tail and broomsedge ; he will see the moss growing 
on the moldering walls of once thrifty villages, and will find ' one only master 
grasps the whole domain,' that once "furnished happy homes for a dozen white 
families. Indeed, a country in its infancj', where fifty years ago scarce a forest 
tree had been felled by the axe of the pioneer, is already exhibiting the painful 
signs of senility and decay, apparent in Virginia and the Carolinas." 

Some one has said that " an honest confession is good for the soul," 
and if the adage be true, as we have no doubt it is, we think Mr. 0. 0. 
Clay is entitled to a quiet conscience on one score at least. In the 
extract quoted above, he gives us a graphic description of the ruinous 
operations and influences of Slavery in the Southwest ; and we, as a 
native of Carolina, and a traveller through Virginia, are ready to bear 
testimony to the fitness of his remarks when he referred to those States 
as examples of senility and decay. With equal propriety, however, 
he might have stopped nearer home for a subject of comparison. 
Either of the States bordering upon Alabama, or, indeed, any other 
slave States, would have answered his purpose quite as well as Virginia 
and the Carolinas. Wherever slavery exists there he may find parallels 
to the destruction that is sweeping with such deadly influence over his 
own unfortunate State. 

As for exami)les of vigorous, industrious and thrifty communities, tliey 
can be found anywhere beyond the Upas-shadow of slavery — nowhere 
else. New York and Massachusetts, which, by nature, are confessedly far 
inferior to Virginia and the Carolinas, have by the more liberal and equit- 
able policy which they have pursued, in substituting liberty for slavery, 
attained a degree of eminence and prosperity altogether unknown in the 
slave States. 

Amidst all the hyperbole and cajolery of slave-driving politicians who, 
as we have already seen, are " the books, the arts, the academies, that 
sliow, contain and govern all the South," we are rejoiced to see that 
Mr. Clay, Mr. Cameron, and a few others, have had the boldness and 
honesty to step forward and proclaim the truth. All such frank admis- 
sions are to be hailed as good omens for the South. Nothing good can 
rome from any attempt to conceal the unconcealable evidences of 
poverty and desolation everywhere trailing in the wake of slavery. Let 
the truth be told on all occasions, of the North as well as of the South, 
and the people will soon begin to discover the egregiousness of their 
errors, to draw just comparisons, to inquire into cause and efiect, and to 
adopt the more utile measures, manners and customs of their wiser 
contemporaries. 

In willfully traducing and decrying everything North of Mason and 
Dixon's line, and in excessively magnifying the importance of every- 
thing South of it, the oligarchy have, in the eyes of all liberal and in- 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 33 

telligent ineu, only made au exhibitiun of their uncommon folly and 
dishonesty. For a long time, it is trne, they have succeeded in deceiv- 
ing the people, in keeping them humbled in the murky sloughs of 
poverty and ignorance, and in instilling into their untutored minds pas- 
sions and prejudices expressly calculated to strengthen and protect the 
accursed institution of slavery ; but, thanks to heaven, their inglorious 
reign is fast drawing to a close ; with irresistible brilliancy, and in spite 
of the interdict of tyrants, light from the pure fountain of knowledge 
is now streaming over the dark places of our land, and, ere long — mark 
onr words — there will ascend from Delaware, and from Texas, and from 
all the intermediate States, a huzza for Freedom and for Equal Eights, 
that will utterly confound the friends of despotism, set at defiance the 
authority of usurpers, and carry consternation to the heart of every 
slavery-propagandist. 

To undeceive the people of the South, to bring them to a knowledge 
of the inferior and disreputable position which they occupy as a com- 
ponent part of the Union, and to give prominence and popularity to 
those plans which, if adopted, will elevate us to an equality, socially, 
morally, intellectually, industrially, politically, and financially, with the 
most flourishing and refined nation in the world, and, if possible, to 
place us in the van of even that, is the object of tliis work. Slave- 
holders, either from ignorance or from a willful disposition to propagate 
error, contend that the South has nothing to be ashamed of, that slavery 
has proved a blessing to her, and that her superiority over the North in 
an agricultural point of view, makes amends for all her short-comings 
in other respects. On the other hand, we contend that many years of 
continual blushing and severe penance would not suffice to cancel or 
annul the shame and disgrace that justly attaches to the South in conse- 
quence of slavery — the direst evil that e'er befell the land — that the 
South bears nothing like even a respectable approximation to the North 
in navigation, commerce or manufactures, and that, contrary to the 
opinion entertained by ninety -nine hundredths of her people, she is far 
behind the free States in the only thing of which she has ever 
dared to boast — agriculture. We submit the question to the arbi- 
tration of figures, which, it is said, do not lie. With regard to the 
bushel-measure ])roducts of the soil, of which we have already taken 
an inventory, we have seen that there is a balance against the South in 
favor of the North of seventeen million four hundred and twenty-three 
thousand one hundred and fifty-tvio lusheh, and a difference in the value 
of the same, also in favor of the North, oi forty -four million seven hun- 
dred a)id eighty -two thousand six hundred and thirty-six dollars. It is 
certainly a most novel kind of agricultural superiority that the South 
claims on that score ! 

Our attention shall now be directed to the twelve princijjal pound- 

2* 



34 COMPAEISONS BKTWEEN THE 

measure products of the free and of the slave States — Tiay, cotton^ but- 
ter and cheese, tobacco, cane-sttgar, wool, rice, Jiemp, maple sugar, bees- 
wax and honey, flax, and hops — and in taking an account of them, we 
shall, in order to show the exact quantity produced in each State, and 
for the convenience of future reference, pursue the same plan as that 
adopted in the preceding tables. Whether slavery will appear to better 
advantage on the scales than it did in the half-bushel, remains to be 
seen. It is possible that the rickety monster may make a better sjiow 
on a new track; but if it makes a more ridiculous display, we shall nut 
be surprised. A careful examination of its precedents, has taught us the 
folly of expecting anything good to issue from it in any manner what- 
ever. It has no disposition to emulate the magnanimity of its betters, 
and as for a laudable ambition to excel, that is a characteristic altogether 
foreign to its nature. Languor and inertia are the insalutary viands 
upon which it delights to satiate its morbid appetite ; and "from bad to 
worse" is the ill-omened motto under which, in all its feeble eftbrts 
and achievements, it ekes out a most miserable and deleterious exist- 
ence. 



COMPARISONS BiaWEEN THE 



35 



AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES — 1850. 



California 

Connecticut. . , 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massacliusetts 
Michigan ... 
N. Uampsliire. 
New .Jersey .. 
New York. . . . 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania 
Rhode Island. 

Vermont 

V/iseousin 



Hay, tons. 




Hemp, tons 



Hops, lbs. 



1- 



12,690,982 



4 
150 
44 



554 

3,551 

92,796 

8,242 

40,120 

121,595 

10,663 

257,174 

2,133 

2,536,299 

63,731 

22,088 

277 

288,023 

15,930 



Fl:ix, lbs. 



17,928 

160,063 

584,469 

62,660 

17,081 

1,162 

7,152 

7,652 

182,965 

940,577 

446,932 

530,307 

85 

20,852 

68,393 



3,463,176 ! 3,048,278 



Maple Sugar, 
lbs. 



60,796 

248,904 

2,921,192 

78,407 

93,542 

795,525 

2,439,794 

1,298,863 

2,197 

10,357,484 

4,588.209 

2,326,525 

28 

6,849,357 

610,976 



32,161,799 



Tobacco, lbs. 



1,000 

1,267,624 

841,394 

1,044,620 

6,041 

138,246 

1,245 

50 

310 

83,189 

10,454,449 

912,651 



1,268 



14,752,087 



T^BLE 6. 

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



STATICS. 


Hay, tons. 


Hemp, tons. 


Hops, lbs. 


Flax, lbs. 


Maple Sugar, 
lbs. ' 


Tobacco, lbs. 


Alabama . ... 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky . . . 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina 
South Carolina 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Virginia 


32,685 
3,976 

30,159 
2,510 

23,449 
113,747 

25,752 
157,956 

12,504 
116,925 
145,653 

20,925 

74,091 

8,354 

369,093 


i5 

' 17,787 

63 

7 

16,028 

39 

" 595 

"139 


276 

157 

848 

14 

261 

4,309 

125 

1,870 

473 

4,130 

9,246 

26 

' 1,032 

7 

11,506 


3,921 

12 291 

17,174 

50 

5,387 

2,100,116 

■ 35.686 

665 

627,160 

593,796 

333 

368,131 

1,048 

1,000,450 


643 
9,380 

50 

437,405 

255 

47,740 

178,910 

27,932 

200 

158,557 

1,227,665 


164,990 
218,936 

998,614 

423,924 

55,501,196 

26,878 
21,407,497 

49,900 
17,113,784 
11,984,780 

74,285 
20,148,932 

66,897 
56,803,227 




! 1,137,784 34,673 


33,780 


4,768,198 


2,088,637 


185,023,906 



36 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 



T'^BLIi; G — Coiatinued. 

AGllICULTURAL PRODUCTS OP THE SLAVE STATES — 1850. 



STATES. 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississii>iii, 

Missouri 

Nortli Carolina 
touth Carolina. 
Teunessee . . . . 

Texas 

Virginia 



Conon, 
bales of -iUU lbs 



504,429 
C5,344 



45,131 

499,091 

758 

1TS,T37 



484,292 



50,545 
300,901 
194,5.32 

58,072 
3,947 



2,445,779 



Cane Sugar, 
bhds. of l.WJO lbs. 



87 



2,750 

846 

10 

226,001 



77 

3 

7,351 



237,133 



Rough Kice, 
lbs. 



2,812,252 
63,179 

1,075,090 

38,950,091 

5,688 

4,425,-349 

2,719,856 

700 

5,465,808 

159,930,613 

258,854 

88,203 

17,154 



215,313,497 



ANIMAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



ANIMAI 


PRODUCTS OF THE 

STATE.5-1850. 


FREE 


ANIMAL 


PRODUCTS OF THE 

STAT E.S— 1850. 


SLAVE 


STATICS. 


Wool, 
lbs. 


liuttcr and 
Cheese, Ib.s. 


P.eeswax & 
Honey, lbs. 


STATE.5. 


\\'ool, 
lbs. 


Rutter and 
Cheese, lbs. 


Beeswax & 
Honey, lbs. 


California.. 


5,520 


855 


Alabama.. 


657,118 


4,040,22.3 


897,021 


Connecticut 


497,454 


11,861.896 


93,304 


Arkansas.. 


182,595 


1,884,-327 


192,338 


Illinois. . . 


2,15ii,113 


13,804,768 


869,444 


Delaware. . 


57,768 


1,058,495 


41,248 


Indiana. . . 


2,610,287 


13,506,099 


9.35,329 


Florida.... 


23,247 


389,513 


18,971 


Iowa 


873,898 


2,881,028 


821,711 


Georgia. . . 


990,019 


4,687,535 


732,514 


Maine 


1 ,304,034 


11,678,265 


189,618 


Kentucky., 


2,297,433 


10,161,477 


1,158,019 


Mass 


5--o,186 


15,1.59,512 


59,508 


Louisiana.. 


109,897 


685,026 


96,701 


MiehiRan 


2,0-l.",,283 


8,077,390 


859,232 


Maryland . 


477,4;« 


3,810,185 


74,802 


New llamp. 


l,l(ts,476 10,173,619 


117,140 


Mississippi. 


559,619 


4,367,425 


897,460 


New Jc'sey 


37."),39C. 9,852,960 


156,694 


Missouri. . . 


1,627,104 


8,0-37,931 


1,328,972 


New \ork. 


10,071,301 129,.'J07,507 


1,755,830 


N. Carolina 


970,738 


4,242,211 


512,289 


Otno 


1.',196,.371 


55,268,921 


804,275 


S. Carolina 


487,233 


2,986,820 


216,281 


Penn 


4,4--l,570 


42,383,452 


809.509 


Tennessee. 


1,864,378 


8,817,266 


1,036,572 


Rhode I.-i... 


129,692 


1,312,178 


6,347 


Texas 


131,917 


2,440,199 


380,825 


Vermont . . 


3,4(10,717 


20,S58,S14 


249,422 


Virginia.. . 


2,860,705 11,525,651 


880,767 


■\\iscousiu.. 


253,903 


4,034,033 


131,005 












•39,647,211 849,S60,T88 

1 


6,683,868 


12,797,329 '68,684,224 


7^9U,760 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATKS. 37 



KECAPITDLATION — FREE STATES. 

flay 28,427,799,680 lbs. @ 1-2 c $142,138,998 

Hemp 443,520 " " 5" 22,176 

Hops 3,463,176 " " 15 " 519,476 

Flax 3,048,278 " " 10" 304,827 

Maple Sugar 32,161,799 " " 8" 2,672,943 

Tobacco 14,762,087 " " 10" 1,475,208 

Wool 39,647,211 " " 36" 13,676,523 

Butter and Cheese 349,860,783 " " 15" 52,479,117 

Beeswax and Honey 6,888,308 " " 15" 1,033,255 



Total 28,878,064,902 lbs., valued as above, $214,422,523 

RECAPITULATION — SLATE STATES. 

Hay 2,548,636,160 lbs. @ 1-2 c $12,743,180 

Hemp 77,667,520 " " 5" 3,883,376 

Hops 33,780 " " 15" 5,007 

Flax 4,766,198 " " 10 " 470,619 

Maple Sugar 2,088,687 " " 8" 167,094 

Tobacco 185,023,906 " " 10" 18,502,390 

Wool 12,797,329 " " 35" 4^479,065 

Butter and Cheese 68,634,224 " " 15" 10,295,133 

Beeswax and Honey 7,964,700 " " 15" 1,194,714 

Cotton 978,311,600 " " 8 " 78,264,928 

CaneSugar 237,133,000 " " 7" 16,599,310 

Rice (rough) 215,313,497 " " 4" 8,612,539 



Total 4,338,370,661 lbs., valued as above, at $155,223,415 

TOTAL DIFFERENCE — POUND-MEASURE PRODUCTS. 

Pounds. Value. 

Free States 28,878,064,902 $214,422,523 

Slave States 4,338,370,661 155,223,415 



Balance in pounds 24,539,694,241 Difference in value, $59,199,108 

Both quantity and value again in favor of the North ! Behold also 
the enormousness of the difference ! In this comparison with the South, 
neither hundreds, thousands, nor millions, according to the regular 
method of computation, are sufficient to exhibit the excess of the pound- 
measure products of the North. Recourse must be had to an almost 
inconceivable number ; billions must be called into play ; and there are 
the figures telling us, with unmistakable emphasis and distinctness, that, 
in this department of agriculture, as in every other, the North is vastly 
the superior of the South — the figures sliowing a total balance in favor 
of the former of twenty-four iillion Jive hundred and thirty-nine million 
six hundred and ninety -four thousand two hundred and forty-one 2>ounds, 
valued s-i fifty -nine million one hundred and ninety-nine thousand one 
hundred and eight dollars And yet the North, as we are unblushingly 
told by the fire-eating politicians of the South, is a poor, God-forsaken 
country, bleak, inhospitable, and unproductive ! 

What next ? Is it necessary to adduce other facts in order to prove 
that the rural wealth of the free States is far greater than that of the 
slave States? Shall we make a further demonstration of the fertility of 
northern soil, or bring foi'ward new evidences of the inefficient and 



38 



COMPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 



desolating system of terra-culture in the South ? Will nothing less than 
" conlinnations strong as proofs of holy writ," suffice to convince the 
South that she is standing in her own light, and ruining both body and 
soul by the retention of slavery ? Whatever duty and expedience re- 
quire to be done, we are willing to do. Additional proofs are at hand. 
Slaveholders and slave-breeders shall be convinced, confuted, convicted, 
and converted. They shall, in their hearts and conscience.?, if not with 
their tongues and pens, bear testimony to the triumphant achieve- 
ments of Free Laboi*. In the two tables which immediately follow these 
remarks, they shall see how much more vigorous and fruitful tlie soil is 
wheu under the prudent management of free white husbandmen, than it 
is when under the rude and nature-murdering tillage of enslaved 
negroes; and in two subsequent tables they sliall find that the live 
stock, slaughtered animals, farms, and farming implements and machin- 
ery, in the free States, are worth at least one thousand million of dol- 
lars more than the market value of the same in the slave States ! In 
the face, however, of all these most significant and incontrovertible 
fact.?, the oligarchy have the unparalleled audacity to tell us that the 
South is the greatest agricultural country in the world, and that tho 
North is a dreary waste, unfit for cultivation, and quite dependent on us 
for the necessaries of life. How preposterously false all such babble is, 
the following tables will show : 

T ^ B Xi K 8. 

ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE AVEUA.GE IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE 

STATES— 1850. 



ACTUAL CROP.-? PT.R ACRE ON Tllj.; 
AVKRAOK IN THE I'JtKK ST AT K.S— 1 SiO. 


ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE 
AVERAGE IN THE SLAVE STATES-1S50. 


STATES. 


B 


5 

c 






(£■1 

85 
115 
100 
100 
120 
170 
140 
220 

ioo 

'75 

100 
178 


STATES. 

Alabama . . 
Arkansas... 
Delaware. . 
Floriiia. .. 
Georgia . . . 
Kentucky.. 
Louisiana.. 
Slaryland.. 
Mississippi. 
Missouri... 
N. Carolina 
S. Carolina 
Tennessee. 

Texas 

A'irginia. . . 







.2 

>. 

CS 

'7 
11 

is 

15 
'7 
"5 


p" 

15 
22 
20 

io 

24 
10 
23 
18 
34 
17 
11 
21 
20 
18 




Connecticut 
Illinois ... 
Indiana .. 

Iowa 

Maine 

Mass 

Michigan . . 
New Hanip. 
New Jersey 
New York.. 

Ohio 

Penn 

Rhode Is. . . 
Vermont. . . 
Wisconsin . 


ii 
i-i 

14 
10 
10 
10 

11 
11 

12 
12 
15 

18 
14 


21 
29 
20 
30 

20 
20 

yo 

20 
25 

21 

SO 
35 


14 

18 

13 

IT 
25 

20 


40 
38 
83 
32 
27 
81 
32 
SO 
88 
2T 
30 
20 

32 
80 


5 

ii 

15 

5 
S 

is 

9 

11 

7 
8 
7 
15 
T 

T21 


12 
18 
20 

is 

18 

2i 

12 
26 
10 
12 
19 

is 


60 

"lV5 
125 
130 

'"75 

105 

110 

65 

70 

120 

250 

75 




161 


825 


107 


436 


1,503 


199 


63 


275 


1,560 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 39 



RKOAPITULATION OF ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE AVERAGE 1850. 



FREE STATES. 

Wheat 12 bushels per acre. 

Oats 27 " " 

Uvc 18 " " 

Indian Corn 31 " " 

Irish Potatoes 125 " " 



SLAVE STATES. 

Wheat 9 bushels per acre. 

Oats 17 " " 

Rye 11 " " 

Indian Coin 20 " " 

Irish I'otalocs 113 " " 



What an obvious contrast between the vigor of Liberty and the 
impotence of Slavery ? What an unanswerable argument in favor of 
free labor ! Add up the two columns of figures above, and what is the 
result? Two hundred and thirteen busliels as the products of five acres 
in the Nortli, and only one hundred and seventy bushels as the products 
of five acres in the South. Look at each item separately, and you will 
find that the average crop per acre of every article enumerated is 
}j;reater in the free States than it is in the slave States. Examine the 
table at large, and you will perceive that Avhile Massachusetts I'-roduces 
sixteen bushels of wheat to the acre, Virginia produces only seven; that 
Pennsylvania produces fifteen and Georgia only five: that while Iowa 
produces thirty-six bushels of oats to the acre, Mississippi produces only 
twelve ; that Rhode Island produces thirty, and North Carolina only 
ten ; that while Ohio produces twenty-five bushels of rye to tlie acre, 
Kentucky produces only eleven ; that Vermont produces twenty, and 
Tennessee only seven : that while Connecticut ])roduces forty bushels 
of Indian corn to the acre, Texas produces only twenty ; that New 
Jersey produces thirty-three, and South Carolina only eleven ; that while 
New llami)shire produces two hundred and twenty bushels of Irish 
potatoes to the acre, Maryland produces only seventy -five ; that Michigan 
])roduces one hundred and forty, and Alabama only sixty. Now for 
other beauties of slavery in another table. 



40 



COMPAKISONS BETWEEN THE 



T ^ B L E 



VALUE OP FARMS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE 

STATES— 1850. 



VALUE 


OF FARMS 


AND DOMESTIC ANI- 


VALUE 01'' FARMS AND DOME.STIC ANI- 


MALS IN THE FREE STATES— 1850. 1 


MALS IN THE 


SLAVE STATES— 1850. 








Cash Value of 








Cash Value of 


States. 


Value of vajueoi 

Live Mock. ^/-"'■"'''^ 
Slaughtered. 


Farms, Farm- 
ing Imp., and 
Machinery. 


States. 


Value of 
Live Stock. 


Animals 
Slaughtered. 


Faim.s, tarm- 
inpr Imp., a;id 
Machinery 


Cal.... 


$3,851,058 


$107,173 


$3,977,524 


Ala.. . . 


$21,690,112 


$4,823,485 


$69,448,887 


Conn.. 


7,407,490 


2,202,266 


74,618,963 


Ark. . 


6,047,969 


1,163,313 


16,866,541 


Illinois 


24,209,253 


4,972,286 


102,5:58,851 


Del.... 


1,849,281 


373,665 


19,390,310 


Ind. .. 


22,478,555 


6,567,935 


143,089,617 


Florida 


2,880,053 


514,685 


6,981,904 


Iowa.. 


8,689,275 


821,164 


17,830,436 


Ga.... 


25,728,416 


6,339,762 


101,647,595 


Maine. 


9,705,726 


1,646,773 


57,146,305 


Ky.... 


29,001,436 


6,462,598 


160,190,299 


Mass. . 


9,647,710 


2,500,924 


112,285,931 


La. . . . 


11,152,275 


1,458,990 


87,391,330 


Mich.. 


8,008,734 


1,323,327 


54,763,817 


Md.. .. 


7,997,634 


1,954,800 


89,641,988 


N. H... 


8,871,901 


1,522,873 


57,560,122 


Miss. .. 


19,403,602 


1 3,636,582 


60,501,561 


N.J... 


10,679,291 


2,638,552 


124,663,014 


Mo. . . . 


19,887,580 


3,367,100 


67,207,068 


N. Y.... 


73,570,499 


13,573,883 


576,631,568 


N. C... 


17,717,647 


5,707,866 


71,823,298 


Ohio . . 


44,121,741 


7,439,243 


371,509,188 


S. C... 


15,060,015 


3,502,637 


86,568,038 


I'eiin. . 


41,500,053 


8,219,848 


422,598,640 


Tenn. . 


29,978,016 


0,401,765 


103,211,422 


R. I. . 


1,532,637 


667,480 


17,508,003 


Texas . 


10,412,927 


I 1,116,137 


18,701.712 


Vt 


12,64;5,223 


1,801,336 


66,106,509 


Va. . . . 


33,656,059 


j 7,502,986 


223,423,815 


Wis. . . 


4,897,385. 


920,178 


30,170,181 






1 






$286,876,541 $56,990,287 

1 


$2,233,058,619 


$253,723,6S7'$54,3S8,377l$l,183,995,274 



RECAPITULATION — FREE STATES. 

Value of live Stock $286,376,541 

Value of Animals slaughtered 56,990,231 

Value of Farms, Farmiug-Implements and Machinery .2,233,058,619 

Total $2,576,425,397 

RECAPITULATION — SLAVE STATES. 

Value of Live Stock $253,723,687 

Value of Animals slaughtered 54,388,377 

Value of Farms, Farming-Implements and Machinery 1,183,995,274 

Total $1,492,107,333 



DIFFERENCE IN VALUE FARMS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 

Free States $2,576,425,397 

Slave States 1,492,107,338 

Balance in favor of the Free States $1,084,318,059 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 41 

By adding to this last balance in favor of the free States the differ- 
ences in value which we found in their favor in our account of the 
bushel-and-pound-measure products, we shall have a very correct idea 
of the extent to which t'le undivided agricultural interests of the free 
States preponderate over those of the slave States. Let us add the 
differences together, and see what will be the result. 

BALAXCES — ALL IN FAVOR OF THE NORTH. 

Difference in the value of bushel-measure products $44,782,636 

Difference in the value of pound-measure products 59,199,108 

Difference in the value of farms and domestic animals 1,084,318,059 

Balance in favor of the Free States 11,188,299,803 

No figures of rhetoric can add emphasis or significance to these 
figures of arithmetic. They demonstrate conclusively the great moral 
triumph of Liberty over Slavery. They show unequivocally, in spite 
of all the blarney and boasting of slaveholding politicians, that the 
entire value of all the agricultural interests of the free States is very 
nearly twice as great as the entire value of all the agricultural interests 
of the slave States — the value of those interests in the former being 
twenty-five hundred million of dollars, that of those in the latter only 
fourteen hundred million, leaving a balance in favor of the free State.'- 
of one Mllion one hundred and eighty-eight million two hundred and 
ninety -nine thousand eight hzmdred and three dollars! That is what 
we call a full, fair and complete vindication of Free Labor. "Would we 
not be correct in calling it a total eclipse of the Black Orb ? 

It will be observed that we have omitted the Territories and the 
District of Columbia in all the preceding tables. "We did this purposely. 
Our object was to draw an equitable comparison between the value of 
free and slave labor in the thirty-one sovereign States, where the two 
systems, comparatively unaffected by the wrangling of politicians, and, 
as a matter of course, free from the interference of the general govern- 
ment, have had the fullest opportunities to exert their influence, to 
exhibit their virtues, and to commend themselves to the sober judgment 
of enlightened and discriminating minds. Had we counted the Territo- 
ries on the side of the North, and the District of Columbia on the side 
of the South, the result would have been still greater in behalf of free 
labor. Though " the sum of all villainies " has but a mere nominal 
existence in Delaware and Maryland, we have invariably counted those 
States on the side of the South ; and the consequence is, that, in many 
particulars, the hopeless fortunes of slavery have been propped up and 
sustained by an imposing array of figures which of right ought to be 
regarded as the property of freedom. But we like to be generous to an 
unfortunate foe, and would utterly disdain the use of any unfair means 
of attack or defence. 



4:2 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

We shall take no undue advantage of slavery. It shall have a fair 
truJ, and be judged according to its deserts. Already has it been 
weighed in the balance, and found wanting ; it has been measured in the 
half-bushel, and found wanting; it has been apprized in the field, and 
found wanting. "Whatever redeeming traits or qualities it may possess, 
if any, shall be brought to light by subjecting it to other tests. 

It was our desire and intention to furnish a correct table of the gallon- 
measure products of the several States of the Union ; but we have not 
been successful in our attempts to procure the necessaiy statistics. 
Enough is known, however, to satisfy us that tlie value of the milk, wine, 
ardent spirits, malt liquors, fluids, oils, and molasses, annually produced 
and sold in the free States, is at least fifty million of dollars grea ior than 
the value of the same articles annually produced and sold in the slave 
States. Of sweet milk alone, it is estimated that the monthly sales in 
three Northern cities, New York, Philadelphia and Boston, amount to a 
larger sum than the marketable value of all the rosin, tar, pitch, and tur- 
pentine, annually produced in the Southern States. 

Our efforts to obtain reliable information respecting another very im- 
portant branch of profitable industry, the lumber business, have also 
proved unavailing ; and we are left to conjecture as to the amount of 
revenue annually derived from it in the two grand divisions of our 
cimntry. The person whose curiosity prompts him to take an account 
of the immense piles of Northern lumber now lying on the wharves and 
houseless lots in Baltimore, Eichmond, and other slaveholding cities, will 
not, we imagine, form a very flattering opinion of the products of 
Southern forests. Let it be remembered that nearly all the clippers, 
steamers, and small craft, are built at the North ; that large cargoes of 
Easteru lumber are exported to foreign countries; that nine-tenths of the 
wooden-ware used in the Southern States is manufactured in New Eng- 
land ; that, in outrageous disregard of the natural rights and claims of 
Southern mechanics, the markets of the South are forever filled with 
Northern furniture, vehicles, axe-helves, walking-canes, yard-sticks, 
clothes-pins and pen-holders ; that the extraordinary number of factories, 
steam-engines, forges and machine-shops in the free States, require an 
extraordinary quantity of cord-wood : that a large majority of the mag- 
nificent edifices and other structures, both private and public, in which 
timber, in its various forms, is extensively used, are to be found in the free 
States -we say, let all these things be remembered, and the truth will 
at once flash across the mind that the forests of the North are a source 
of fiir greater income than those of the South. The difference is simply 
this : At the Nortli everything is turned to advantage. When a tree is 
cut down, the main body is sold or used for luniber, railing, or paling, the 
stump for matches or slioepegs,the knees for ship-building and the branches 
for' fuel. At the South everything is either neglected or nismanaged. 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 43 

Whole forests are felled by the ruthless hand of slavery, the trees are cut 
into logs, rolled into heaps, covered with the limbs and brush, and then 
burned on the identical soil that gave them birth. The land itself next 
falls a prey to the fell destroyer, and that which was once a beautiful, 
fertile, and luxuriant woodland, is soon despoiled of all its treasures, and 
converted into an eye-oifending desert. 

Were we to go beneath the soil and collect all the mineral and lapida- 
rious wealth of the free States, we should find it so much greater than 
the corresponding wealth of the slave States, that no ordinary combina- 
tion of figures would suffice to express the difference. To say nothing of 
tlie gold and quicksilver of California, the iron and coal of Pennsylvania, 
the copper of Michigan, the lead of Illinois, or the salt of New York, 
the marMe and free-stone quarries of New England are^ incrediile as it 
may ^eem to those unacquainted with the facts, far more important 
sources of revenue than all the subterranean deposits of the slave States. 
From the most reliable statistics within our reach, we are led to the 
inference that tlie total value of all the precious metals, rocks, minerals and 
medicinal waters, annually extracted from the bowels of the free States, 
is not less than eighty-five million of dollars ; the whole value of the same 
substances annually brought up from beneath the surface of the slave 
States does not exceed twelve millions. In this respect to what is our 
poverty ascribable ? To the same cause that has impoverished and dis- 
lionored us in all other respects — the thriftless and degrading system ol 
human slavery. 

Nature has been kind to us in all tilings. The strata and substrata 
of the South are profusely enriched with gold and silver, and precious 
stones, and from the natural orifices and aqueducts in Virginia and 
North Carolina, flow the purest healing waters in the world. But of 
what avail is all this latent wealth ? Of what avail will it ever be, so 
long as slavery is permitted to play the dog in the manger ? To tliese 
queries there can be but one reply. Slavery must be throttled ; the 
South, so great and so glorious by nature, must be reclaimed from her 
infamy and degradation ; our cities, fields and forests, must be kept 
intact from the unsparing monster ; the various and ample resources of 
our vast domain, subterraneous as well as superficial, must be developed, 
and made to contribute to our pleasures and to the necessities of the world. 
A very significant chapter, and one particularly pertinent to many of 
the preceding pages, might be written on the Decline of Agriculture in 
tlie Slave States ; but as the press of other subjects admonishes us to be 
concise upon tins point, we shall present only a few of the more striking 
instances. In tlie first place, let us compare the crops of wheat and rye 
in Kentucky, in 1850, with tlie corresponding crops in the same State 
in 1840 — after which, we will apply a similar rule of comparison to two 
or three other slaveholding States. 



u 



COMPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 



KENTUCKY. 

Wheat, bus. 

Crop of 1840 4,803,152 

" 1850 2,142,822 



Rye, bus. 

1,321,373 

415,073 



Decrease 2,G60,330 bus. Decrease 90G,300 bus. 



TENNESSEE. 

Wheat, bus. 

Crop of 1840 4,569,G92 

" 1850 1,019,386 



Tobacco, lbs. 
29,550,432 
20,148,932 



Decrease 2,950,306 bus. Decrease 9,401,500 lbs. 



VIRGINIA. 

Rye, bus. 

Crop of 1840 1,482,799 

" 1850 458,930 



Tobacco, lbs. 
75,347,106 
56,803,227 



Decrease 1,023,869 bus. Decrease 18,543,879 lbs 



Wheat, bus. 

Crop of 1840 838,052 

" 1850 294,044 



Decrease 544,008 bus. 



Rye, bus. 
51,000 
17,261 



Decrease 33,739 bus. 



The story of these figures is too intelligible to require words of expla- 
nation ; we shall, therefore, drop this part of our subject, and proceed 
to compile a couple of tables that will exhibit on a single page the 
wealth, revenue and expenditure, of the several States of the confederacy. 
Let it be distinctly understood, however, that, in the compilation of 
these tables, three million two hundred and four thousand three hun- 
dred and thirteen negroes are valued as personal property, and credited 
to the Southern States as if they were so many horses and asses, or 
bridles and blankets — and that no monetary valuation whatever is placed 
on any creature, of any age, color, sex or condition, that bears tlie 
upright form of man in the free States. 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 



45 



'I? A. B L. E 1 O . 

WEALTH, REVENUE, AND EXPENDITURE OF THE FREE AND OF THE SLAVE 

STATES — 1S50. 



WKALT! 


, REVENUE, 


AND EXPENDITURE 


WEALTH, REVENUE, 


AND EXPENDITURE 


OF THE FRKE 


STATES-1S50. 


OF THE SLAVE 


STATES— 1850. 


Stales. 


Real and 
Fei^oiial 


Revenue. 


Expend! - 


States. 


Real and 
I'eisonMl 


Revenue. 


E>pi-ndi- 




F.ppeity. 








Properly. 






Cal 


$22,161,872 


$366,825 


$925,625 


Ala. . . . 


$228,204,332 


$658,976 


$513,559 


Conn.... 


155,707,980 


150,189 


1:37,326 


Ark. . . . 


89,841,025 


68,412 


74,076 


Illinois. 


156,265,006 


736,0:30 


192 940 


Del. . . . 


18,855,863 






Indiana 


21)2,650,264 


1,283,064 


1,061,605 


Florida. 


23,198,734 


60,619 


55,234 


Iowa. .. 


2:5,714,638 


139,681 


131,6:31 


Georgia 


335,425,714 


1,142,405 


597,882 


Maine.. 


122,777,571 


744,879 


624,101 


Ky 


301,628,406 


779,293 


674,697 


JIass... 


57:3,:342,2S6 


598,170 


674,622 


La 


2:33,998,764 


1,146,568 


1,098,911 


Mich . . 


59,7s7,255 


&4S,:326 


4:31,91* 


Md 


219,217,364 


1,279,953 


1,360,458 


N. H. . 


10:3,652,8:35 


141,686 


149,!S90 


Miss 


223,951,130 


221,200 


223,637 


N. J.... 


158,151,619 


1:39,166 


180,614 


Mo 


137,247,707 


826,579 


207,656 


N. Y. . . 


1,080,309,216 


2,G9S,310 


2,520,932 


N. 0. . . 


226,800,472 


219,000 


228,173 


Ohio . . . 


504,726,120 


8,016,408 


2,736,0*50 


S. C. . . . 


288,257,694 


582,152 


463,021 


Penn. .. 


729,144,998 


7,716,552 


6,876,480 


Tenn. .. 


207,454,704 


502,126 


623,625 


R I.... 


80,508,794 


124,94^ 


115,885 


Texas . . 


55,:362,:340 


140,688 


156,622 


Vt 


92,205,049 


185,880 


183,058 


Va 


391,646,438 


1 1,265,744 


1,272,382 


■\Vi3. . . . 


42,056,595 


135,155 


136,096 












$4,102,172,108 


$18,725,211 


$17,076,733 


$2,936,090,737 


j $8,843,715 


$7,549,933 



Entire Wealth of the Free States, $4,102,172,108 

Entu-e Wealth of the Slave States, including Slaves, 2,936,090,737 

Balance ia favor of the Free States, $1,166,081,371 

What a towering monument to the beauty and glory of Free Labor ! 
What h-refragable evidence of the unequalled efficacy and grandeur of 
free institutions ! These figures are, indeed, too full of meaning to be 
passed by without comment. The two tables from which they are bor- 
rowed are at least a volume within themselves; and, after all the pains 
we have taken to compile them, we shall, perhaps, feel somewhat dis- 
appointed if the reader fails to avail himself of the important information 
they impart. 

Human life, in all ages, has been made up of a series of adventures and 
experiments, and even at this stage of the world's existence, we are, 
perhaps, almost as destitute of a perfect rule of action, secular or reli- 
gious, as were the erratic contemporaries of Noah. It is true, however, 
that we have made some progress in the right direction ; and as it seems 
to be the tendency of the world to correct itself, we may suppose that 
future generations will be enabled, by intuition, to discriminate between 
the true and the false, the good and the bad, and that with the develop- 
ment of this faculty of the mind, error and discord will begin to wane, 



46 COMPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 

and finally cease to exist. Of all the experiments that have been tried 
by the people in America, slavery lias proved the most fatal ; and the 
sooner it is abolished the better it will be for us, for posterity, and for 
the world. One of the evils resulting from it, and that not the least, is 
apparent in the figures above. Indeed, the unprofitaMeness of slavery 
is a monstrous evil, when considered in all its bearings ; it makes us 
poor ; poverty makes us ignorant ; ignorance makes us wretched ; 
wretchedness makes us wicked, and wickedness leads to — the devil ! 

"IgQorance is the curse of God, 
Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven." 

Facts truly astounding are disclosed in the two last tables, and we 
could heartily wish that every intelligent American would conunit them 
to memory. The total value of all the real and personal property of the 
free States, with an area of only 012,597 square miles, is one billion one 
hundred and sixty-six million eighty-one thousand three hundred and 
seventy-one dollars greater than the total value of all the real and per- 
sonal property, including the price of 3,204,313 negroes, of the slave 
States, which have an area of 851,508 square miles/ But extraordinary 
as this difference is in favor of the North, it is much less than the true 
amount. On the authority of Southrons themselves, it is demonstrable 
beyond the jwssHility of refutation that the intriiuic value of all the 
property in the free States is more than three times greater than the 
intrinsic value of all the property in the slave States. 

James Madison, a Southern man, fourth President of the United 
States, a most correct thinker, and one of the greatest statesmen the 
country has produced, " thought it wrong to admit the idea that there 
could be property in men," and we indorse, to the fullest extent, this 
opinion of the profound editor of the Federalist. "We shall not recognize 
property in men ; the slaves of the South are not worth a groat in auy 
civilized community ; no man of genuine decency and refinement would 
hold them as property on any terms; in the eyes of all enlightened 
nations and individuals, tliey are men, not merchandise. Southern pro- 
slavery politicians, some of whom have not liesitated to buy and sell 
their own sons and daughters, boast that the slaves of the South are 
worth sixteen hundred million of dollars, and we have seen the amount 
estimated as high as two thousand million. Mr, De Bow, the Southern 
superintendent of the seventh census, informs us that the value of all the 
pi'operty in the slave States, real and personal, including slaves, was, in 
1850, only $2,930,090,737; while, according to the same authority, the 
value of all the real and personal property in the free States, genuine 
property, property that is everywhere recognized as property, was, at 
the same time, $4,102,172,108. Now all we have to do in order to 
ascertain the i-cal value of all the property of the South , independent of 



FKEB AND THE SLAVE STATES. 47 

cegroes, -whose value, if valuable at all, is of a local and precarious 
character, is to subtract from the sum total of Mr. De Bow's return of 
the entire wealth of the slave States the estimated value of the slaves 
themselves; and then, by deducting the difference from the intrinsic value 
of all the property in the free States, we shall have the exact amount of 
the overplus of wealth in the glorious land of free soil, free labor, free 
speech, free presses, and free schools. And now to the task. 

Entire Wealth of the Slave States, including Slaves, $2,936,090,737 

Estimated Value of the Slaves, 1,000,000,000 

True Wealth of the Slave States, : $1,33G,0'J0,737 

True Wealth of the Free States, $4,102,172,108 

True Wealth of the Slave States, I,330,0ij0,737 

Balance in favor of the Free States, |2,7GG,0»1,371 

There, friends of the South and of the North, you have the conclusion 
of the whole matter. Liberty and slavery are before you : choose which 
you will have; as for us, in the memorable language of the immortal 
Henry, we say, "give us liberty, or give us death !" In the great strug- 
gle for wealth that has been going on between the two rival systems of 
free and slave labor, the balance above exhibits the net profits of the 
former. The struggle on the one side has been calm, laudable, and emi- 
nently successful ; on the other, it has been attended by tumult, unutter- 
able cruelties and disgraceful failure. We have given the slave oligarchy 
every conceivable opportunity to vindicate their domestic policy, but for 
them to do it is a moral impossibility. 

Less than three-quarters of a century ago — say in 1789, for that was 
about the average time of the abolition of slavery in the Northern 
States — the South, with advantages in soil, climate, rivers, harbors, 
minerals, forests, and, indeed, almost every other natural resource, be- 
gan an even race with the North in all the important pursuits of life; 
and now, in the brief space of scarce three score years and ten, we find 
her completely distanced, enervated, dejected and dishonored. Slave- 
owners and slave-drivers are the sole authurs of her disgrace ; as they 
have sown, so let them reap. 

As we have seen above, a careful and correct inventory of all the real 
and personal^rop<?ri!/ in the two grand divisions of the country, discloses 
the astounding fact, that in 1850, the free States were worth precisely 
two thousand semn Tiundred and sixty-six million eigJity-one thousand 
three hundred and seventy-one dollars more than all the slave States! 
Twenty-seven hundred million of dollars ! Think of it ! What a vast 
and desirable sum, and how much better oft' the South would be with 
it than without it ! Such is the enormous amount out of which slavery 
has defrauded us during the space of sixty-one years — from 1T89 to 1850 



48 COilPAEISONS BETWEEN THE 

—being an average of about forty-five million three hundred and fifty 
thousand dollars per annum. During the last twenty-five or thirty years, 
however, our annual losses have been far greater than they were former- 
ly. There has been a gradual increase every year, and now the ratio of 
increase is almost incredible. No patriotic Southerner can become con- 
versant with the facts without experiencing a feeling of alarm and indig- 
nation. Until the North abolished slavery, she had no advantage of us 
whatever ; the South was more than her equal in every respect. But 
no sooner had she got rid of that hampering and pernicious institution 
than she began to absorb our wealth, and now it is confidently believed 
that the merchants and slaveholding pleasure-seekers of the South an- 
nually pour one hundred and twenty million of dollars into her coflFers ! 
Taking into account, then, the probable amount of money that has been 
drawn from the South and invested in the North within the last eight 
years, and adding it to the grand balance above — the net profits of the 
North up to 1850 — it may be safely assumed that, in the present year of 
grace, 1839, the free States are worth at least thirty-five hundred million 
of dollars more than the slave States! Let him who dares, gainsay these 
remarks and calculations ; no truthful tongue will deny them ; no hon- 
orable pen can controvert them. 

One more word now as to the valuation of negroes. Were our nature 
so degraded, or our conscience so elastic as to permit us to set a price 
upon men, as Ave would set a price upon cattle and corn, we should be 
content to abide by the appraisement of the slaves at the South, and 
would then enter into a calculation to ascertain the value of foreigners 
to the North. Not long since, it was declared in the South that "one 
free laborer is equal to five slaves," and as there are two million, five 
hundred thousand Europeans in the free States, all of whom are free la- 
borers, we might bring Southern authority to back us in estimating their 
value at sixty-two hundred million of dollars — a handsome sum where- 
withal to ofiset the account of sixteen hundred million of dollars^ 
brought forward as to the value of Southern slaves ! It is obvious, 
therefore, that if we were disposed to follow the barbarian example of 
the traflickers in human flesh, we could prove the North vastly richer 
than the South in bone and sinew — to say nothing of mind and morals, 
which shall receive our attention hereafter. The North has just as much 
right to appraise the Irish immigrant, as the South has to set a price on 
the African slave. But as it would be wrong to do either, we shall do 
neither. It is not our business to think of man as a merchantable com- 
modity ; and we will not, even by implication, admit " the wild and 
guilty fantasy," that the condition of chattelhood may rightfully attach 
to sentient and immortal beings. 

For tl'C prrpo^e of sliowiiig what Virginia, once the richest, most 
paiMildii-, ;i:i(l most powerful of the States, has become under tlie bbght 



FREE AJ^D TUE SLAVE STATES. 49 

of slavery, we shall now introduce an extract from one of the speeches 
delivered by Governor "Wise, during a late gubernatorial campaign in that 
degraded commonwealth. Addressing a Virginia audience, in language 
as graphic as it is truthful, he says : 

" Commerce has long ago spread her sails, and sailed away from you. You 
have not, as yet, dug more than coal enough to warm yourselves at your own 
hearths ; you have set no tilt-hammer of Vulcan to strike blows worthy of gods in 
your own iron-foundries ; j'ou have not yet spun more than coarse cotton enough, 
in the way of manufacture, to clothe your own slaves. You have no commerce, 
no mining, no manufactures. You have relied alone on the single power of agri- 
culture, and such agriculture .' Your sedge-patches outshine the sun. Your inat- 
tention to your only source of wealth, has seared the very bosom of mother earth. 
Instead of having to feed cattle on a thousand hills, you have had to chase the 
stump-tailed steer through the sedge-patches to procure a tough beef-steak. The 
present condition of things has existed too long in Virginia. The landlord has 
skinned the tenant, and the tenant has skinned the land, until all have grown poor 
together." 

With tears in its eyes, and truth on its lips, for the first time after an 
interval of twenty years, the Richmond Enquirer helps to paint tlie 
melancholy picture. In 1852, that journal thus bewailed the condition 
of Virginia : 

" We have cause to feel deeply for our situation. Philadelphia herself contains 
a population far greater than the whole free population of Eastern Virginia. The 
little State of Massachusetts has an aggregate wealth exceeding that of Virginia by 
more than $126,000,000." 

Just a score of years before these words were penned, the same paper, 
then edited by the elder Ritchie, made a most earnest appeal to the in- 
telligence and patriotism of Virginia, to adopt an effectual measure for 
the speedy overthrow of the pernicious system of human bondage. 
Here is an extract from an article which appeared in its editorial column 
under date of January 7th, 1882 : 

" Something must be done, and it is the part of no honest man to deny it — of no 
free press to affect to conceal it. When this dark population is growing upon 
us ; when every new census is but gathering it3 appalling numbers upon us; when, 
within a period equal to that in which this Federal Constitution has been in exist- 
ence, these numbers will increase to more than two millions within Virginia; when 
our sister States are closing their doors upon our blacks for sale, and when our 
whites are moving westwardly in greater numbers than we like to hear of, when 
this, the fairest land on all this continent, for soil, and climate, and situation, com- 
bined, might become a sort of garden spot, if it were worked by the hands of white 
men alone, can we, ought we, to sit quietly down, fold our arms, and say to each 
other, 'Well, well; this thing will not come to the worst in our days; we will 
leave it to our children, and our grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, to take 
care of themselves, and to brave the storm !' Is this to act like wise men? Means 
sure but gradual, systematic but discreet, ought to be adopted, for reducing the 
mass of evil which is pressing upon the South, and will still more press upon her, 
the longer it is put off. We say now, in the utmost sincerity of our hearts, that 
our wisest men cannot give too much of their attention to this subject, nor can 
they give it too soon." 

Better abolition doctrine than this is seldom heard. Why did not the 
Enquirer continue to preach it? What potent influence hushed its 
c'arion voice, just as it began to be lifted in belialf of a liberal policy 

•6 



50 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

and an enlightened humanity ? Had Mr. Ritchie continued to press the 
truth home to the hearts of the people, as he sliould have done, Virginia, 
instead of being worth only $392,000,000 in 1850 — negroes and all — 
would have been worth at least $800,000,000 in genuine property; and 
if the State had emancipated her slaves at the time of the adoption of 
the Constitution, the last census would no doubt have reported her 
wealth, and correctly, at a sum exceeding a thousand millions of 
dollars. 

Listen now to the statement of a momentous fact. The value of all 
the property, real and personal, including slaves, in seven slave States, 
Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, Florida and 
Texas, is less than the real and personal estate, which is unquestionable 
property, in the single State of New York. Nay, worse ; if eight entire 
slave States, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Maryland, Missouri, Missis- 
sippi, Tennessee and Texas, and the District of Columbia — with all their 
hordes of human merchandise — were put up at auction, New York 
could buy them all, and then have one hundred and thirty-three mil- 
lions of dollars left in her pocket ! Such is the amazing contrast between 
freedom and slavery, even in a pecuniary point of view. "When we 
come to compare the North with the South in regard to literature, 
general intelligence, inventive genius, moral and religious enterprises, 
the discoveries in medicine, and the progress in the arts and sciences, 
we shall, in every instance, find the contrast equally great on the side 
of Liberty. 

It gives us no pleasure to say hard things of the Old Dominion, the 
mother of Washington, Jetferson, Henry, and other illustrious patriots, 
who, as we shall prove hereafter, were genuine abolitionists ; but the 
policy which she has pursued has been so utterly inexcusable, so unjust 
to the non-slaveholding whites, so cruel to the negroes, and so disre- 
gardful of the rights of humanity at large, that it becomes the duty of 
every one who makes allusion to her history, to expose her follies, her 
crimes, and her poverty, and to publish every fact, of whatever nature, 
that would be instrumental in determining others to eschew her bad 
example. She has willfully departed from the faith of the founders of 
this Republic. She has not only turned a deaf ear to the counsel of 
wise men from other States in the Union, but she has, in like manner, 
ignored the teachings of the great warriors and statesmen who have 
sprung from her own soil. In a subsequent chapter, we expect to show 
that all, or nearly all, the distinguished Virginians, whose bodies have 
been consigned to the grave, but whose names have been given to his- 
tory, and whose memoirs have a place in the hearts of their countrymen, 
were the fi-iends and advocates of universal freedom — that they were 
inflexibly opposed to the extension of slavery into the Territories, 
devised measures for its restriction, and, with hopeful anxiety, looked 



FEEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 51 

for\vard to the time when it should be eradicated from the States 
themselves. With them, the rescue of our country from British domi- 
nation, and the establishment of the General Government upon a firm 
basis, were considerations of paramount importance ; they supposed, 
and no doubt earnestly desired, that the States, in their sovereign capa- 
cities, would soon abolish a system of wrong and despotism which was 
so palpably in conflict with the principles enunciated in the Declaration 
of Independence. Indeed, it would seem that, among the framers of 
that immortal instrument and its equally immortal sequel, the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, there was a tacit understanding to this eflFect ; 
and the N^orthern States, true to their implied faith, abolished it within 
a short period after our national independence had been secured. N^ot 
so with the Soutli. She has pertinaciousl}" refused to perform her duty. 
She has apostatized from the faith of her greatest men, and even at this 
very moment repudiates the sacred principle that " all men are endowed 
by their Creator with certain unalienable rights," among which " are 
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." It is evident, therefore, that 
the free States are the only members of this confederacy that have 
established republican forms of government based upon the theories of 
Washington, Jefterson, Madison, Henry, and other eminent statesmen 
of Virginia. 

The great revolutionary movement which was set on foot in Charlotte, 
Mecklenburg county, iSTorth Carolina, on the 20th day of May, 1Y75, has 
not yet been terminated, nor will it be, until every slave in the United 
States is freed from the tyranny of his master. Every victim of the 
vile institution, whether white or black, must be reinvested with the 
sacred rights and privileges of which he has been deprived by an inhu- 
man oligarchy. What our noble sires of the revolution left unfinished 
it is our duty to complete. They did all that true valor and patriotism 
could accomplish, Not one iota did they swerve from their plighted 
faith ; the self-sacrificing spirit which they evinced will command the 
applause of every succeeding age. Not in vindication of their own per- 
sonal rights merely, but of the rights of humanity ; not for their own 
generation and age simply, but for all ages to the end of time, they gave 
their toil, their treasure and their blood, nor deemed them all too great 
a price to pay for the establishment of so comprehensive and beneficent a 
principle. Let their posterity emulate their courage, their disinterested- 
ness, and their zeal, and especially remember that it is the duty of every 
existing generation so to provide for its individual interests, as to confer 
superior advantages on that which is to follow. To this principle the 
North has adhered with the strictest fidelity. How has it been with the 
South ? Has she imitated the praiseworthy example of our illustrious 
ancestors ? No ! She has treated it with the utmost contempt ; she 
has been extremely selfish — so selfish, indeed, that she has robbed pos 



52 COMPARISONS BETWEEN TEE 

terity of its natural, inalienable rights. From the period of the forma- 
tion of the government down to the present moment, her policy has 
been downright suicidal, and, as a matter of course, wholly indefensi- 
ble. She has hugged a viper to her breast ; her whole system has been 
paralyzed, her conscience is seared, and, still holding in her embrace the 
cause of her shame and suffering, she is becoming callous to every 
principle of justice and magnanimity. Except among the non-slave- 
holders, who, beside being kept in the grossest ignorance, are under the 
restraint of all manner of iniquitous laws, patriotism has almost ceased 
to exist within her borders. And here we desire to be distinctly under • 
stood, for we shall have occasion to refer to this matter again. We 
repeat, therefore, the substance of our averment, that, at this day, there 
is scarcely a grain of pure patriotism in the South, except among the 
non-slaveholders. Subsequent pages shall testify to the truth of this 
assertion. Here and there, it is true, a slaveholder, disgusted with the 
institution, becomes ashamed of himself, emancipates his negroes, and 
enters upon the walks of honorable life ; but these cases are exceedingly 
rare, and do not, in any manner, disprove the general correctness of our 
remark. All persons who do voluntarily manumit their slaves, as 
mentioned above, are undeniably actuated by principles of pure patriot- 
ism, justice and humanity ; and so believing, we delight to do them 
honor. 

Once more to the Old Dominion. At her door we lay the bulk of 
the evils of slavery. The first African sold in America was sold on 
James Eiver, in that State, on the 20th of August, 1620 ; and although the 
institution was fastened upon her and the other colonies by the mother 
country, she was the first to perceive its blighting and degrading influ- 
ences, her wise men were the first to denounce it, and, after the British 
power was overthrown at Yorktown, she should have been the first to 
abolish it. Fifty-seven years ago she was the Empire State ; now, with 
half a dozen other slaveholding States thrown into the scale with her, 
she is far inferior to New York, which, at the time Cornwallis surren- 
dered his sword to Washington, was less than half her equal. Had she 
obeyed the counsels of the good, the great and the wise men of our 
nation — especially of her own incomparable sons, the extensible element 
of slavery would have been promptly arrested, and the virgin soil of 
nine Southern States, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Ala- 
bama, Missouri, Arkansas, Florida, and Texas, would have been saved 
from its horrid pollutions. Confined to the original States in which it 
existed, the system would soon have been disposed of by legislative 
enactments, and long before the present day, by a gradual process that 
could have shocked no interest and alarmed no prejudice, we should 
have rid ourselves not only of African slavery, which is an abomination 
and a curse, but also of the negroes themsolve.'?, wlio, in our judgment, 



FREE .IND THE SLAVE STATES. ^S 

whether viewed in relation to their actual characteristics and condition, 
or through the strong antipathies of the whites, are, to say the least, an 
undesirable population. 

This, then, is the ground of our expostulation with Virginia : that, in 
stubborn disregard of the advice and friendly warnings of Washington, 
Jefferson, ^^ladison, Henry, and a host of other distinguished patriots 
who sprang from her soil — patriots whose voices shall be heard before 
we finish our task— and in utter violation of every principle of justice 
and humanity, she still persists in fostering an institution or system which 
is so manifestly detrimental to her vital interests. Every Yirginian, whe- 
ther living or dead, whose name is an honor to his country, has placed on 
record his abhorrence of slavery, and in doing so, has borne testimony 
to the blight and degradation that everywhere follow in its course. One 
of the best abolition speeches we have ever read was delivered in the 
Virginia House of Delegates, January 20th, 1832, by Charles James 
Faulkner, who still lives, and who has, we understand, generously eman- 
cipated several of his slaves, and sent them to Liberia. Here follows 
an extract from his speech ; let Southern politicians read it attentively, 
and imbibe a moiety of the spirit of patriotism which it breathes : 

" Sir, I am gratified to perceive that no gentleman has yet risen in this Hall, the 
avowed advocate of slavery. The day has gone by ivhen such a voice could be lis- 
tened to with patience, or even loith forbearance. I even regret, sir, that we should 
find those amongst us who enter the lists of discussion as its apologists, except alone 
upon the ground of uncontrollable necessity. And yet, who could have listened 
to the very eloquent remarks of the gentleman from Brunswick, without being 
forced to conclude that he at least considered slavery, however not to be defended 
upon principle, yet as being divested of much of its enormity, as you approach it in 
practice. 

'•Sir. if there be one who concurs with that gentleman in the harmless character 
of this institution, let me request him to compare the condition of the slaveholding 
portion of this comnonweailh — barren, desolate and seared as it were by the avenging 
hand of Heaven— ■xith the descriptions which we have of this country from those 
who first broke its virgin soil. To what is this change ascribable ? Alone to the 
vaithcring and blasting effects of slavery. If this does not satisfy him, let me request 
him to extend his travels to tha Northern States of this Union, and beg him to con- 
trast the happiness and contentment which prevail throughout that country, the 
busy and cheerful sound of industry, the rapid and swelling growth of their popula- 
tion, their means and institutions of education, their skill and proficiency in the 
useful arts, their enterprise and public spirit, the monuments of their commercial 
and manufacturing industry ; and, above all, their devoted attachment to the govern- 
ment from which they derive their protection, with the derision, discontent, indoleme 
and poverty of the Southern country. To what, Sir, is all this ascribable ? To that 
vice in the organization of society, by which one-half of its inhabitants arc arrayed in 
interest and feeling against the other half— to that unfortunate state of society in 
which freemen regard labor as disgraceful, and slaves shrink from it as a burden 
tyrannically imposed upon them— to that condition of things in which half a millicn 
of your population can feel no sympathy with the society in the prosperity of which 
they are forbidden to participate, and no attachment to a government at whose 
hands they receive nothing but injustice. 
1 " If this should not be sufficient, and the curious and incredulous inquirer should 
suggest that the contrast which has been adverted to, and which is so manifest, 
might be traced to a difference of climate, or other causes distinct from slavery 
itself, permit me to refer him to the two States of Kentucky and Ohio. No differ- 
ence of soil, no diversity of climate, no diversity in the original settlement of those 
two States, can account for the remarkable disproportion in their natural advance- 
ment. Separated by a river alone, they seem to have been purposely and providen- 



54 COMPAEISOKS BETWEEN THE 

iially designed to exhibit in their future histories the difference which necessarily results 
from a country free from, and a country afflicted with, the curse of slavery. 

" Vaiu and idle is every effort to strangle this inquiry. As well might you attempt 
to chain the ocean, or stay the avenging thunderbolts of Heaven, as to drive the 
people from any inquiry which may result in their better condition. This is too 
deep, too engrossing a subject of consideration. It addresses itself too strongly to 
our interests, to our passions, and to our feelings. I shall advocate no scheme that 
does not respect the right of property, so far as it is entitled to be respected, with a 
jast regard to the safety and resources of the State. I would approach the subject 
as one of great magnitude and delicacy, as one whose varied and momentous con- 
sequences demand the calmest and most deliberate investigation. But still, sir, I 
would approach it — aye, delicate as it may be, encompassed as it may be with 
difficulties and hazards, I would still approach it. The people demand it. Their 
security requires it. In the language of the wise and prophetic Jefferson, ' You 
must approach it — ^you must bear it — you must adopt some plan of emancipation, 
or worse will follow.' " 

Mr. Curtis, in a speech in the Virginia Legislature in 1832, said : 

" There is a malaria in the atmosphere of these regions, which the new comer 
shuns, as being deleterious to his views and habits. See the wide-spreading ruin 
which the avarice of our ancestral government has produced in the South, as wit- 
nessed in a sparse population of freemen, deserted habitations, and fields without 
cvdture ! Strange to tell, even the wolf, driven back long since by the approach of 
man, now returns, after the lapse of a hundred years, to howl over the desolations 
of slavery. ' ' 

Mr. Moore, also a memher of the Legislature of Virginia, in speaking 
of the evils of slavery, said : 

" The first I shall mention is the irresistible tendency which it has to undermine 
and destroy everything like virtue and morality in the community. If we look 
back through the long course of time which has elapsed since the creation to the 
present moment, we shall scarcely be able to point out a people whose situation 
was not. in many respects, preferable to our own, and that of the other States, in 
which negro slavery exists. 

" In that part of the State below tide-water, the whole face of the country wears 
an appearance of almost utter desolation, distressing to the beholder. The very 
spot on which our ancestors landed, a little more than two hundred years ago, ap- 
pears to be on the eve of again becoming the haunt of wild beasts." 

Mr. Rives, of Camphell county, said: 

" On the multiplied and desolating evils of slavery, he was not disposed to say 
much. The curse and deteriorating consequence were within the observation and 
experience of the members of the House and the people of Virginia, and it did not 
seem to him that there could be two opinions about it." 

Mr. Powell said : 

" I can scarcely persuade myself that there is a solitary gentleman in this House 
who will not readily admit that slavery is an evil, and that its removal, if practica- 
ble, is a consummation most devoutly to be wished. I have not heard, nor do I 
expect to hoar, a voice raised in this Hall to the contrary." 

In the language of the I^ew Yorh Times, " we might multiply extracts 
almost indefinitely from Virginia authorities — testifying to the blight 
and degradation that have overtaken the Old Dominion, in every depart- 
ment of her atFairs. Her commerce gone, her agriculture decaying, her 
land falling in value, her mining and manufactures noticing, her schools 
dying out, — she presents, according to the testimony of her own sons, 



FKEE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 55 

the saddest ol all pictures — that of a sinking and dying State." Every 
year leaves her in a worse condition than it found her ; and as it is with 
Virginia, so it is with the entire South. In the terse language of Gov. 
Wise, " all have grown poor together." The black god of slavery, 
which the South has worshipped for two hundred and thirty-nine 
years, is but a devil in disguise; and if we .would save ourselves from 
being ingulfed in utter ruin we must repudiate this foul god, for a 
pnrer deity, and abandon his altars for a holier shrine. No time is to 
be lost ; his fanatical adorers, the despotic adversaries of human liberty, 
are concocting schemes for the enslavement of all the laboring classes, 
irrespective of race or color. The issue is before us ; we cannot evade 
it ; we must meet it with firmness, and with unflinching valor. 

We have been credibly informed by a gentleman from Powhattar 
county in Virginia, that in the year 1836 or '37, or about that time, the 
Eon. Abbott Lawrence, of Boston, backed by his brother Amos and 
other millionaires of New England, went down to Richmond with the 
sole view of reconnoitering the manufacturing facilities of that place — 
fully determined, if pleased with the water-power, to erect a large num- 
ber of cotton-mills and machine-shops. He had been in the capital of 
Virginia only a day or two before he discovered, much to his gratifica- 
tion, that nature had shaped everything to his liking; and as he was a 
business man who transacted blisiness in a business-like manner, he lost 
no time in making preliminary arrangements for the consummation of 
his noble purpose. His mission was one of peace and promise ; others 
were to share the benefits of his concerted and laudable scheme ; thou- 
sands of poor boys and girls in Virginia, instead of growing up in ex- 
treme poverty and ignorance, or of having to emigrate to the free States 
of the West, were to have avenues of profitable employment opened to 
them at home ; thus they would be enabled to earn an honest and reputa- 
ble living, to establish and sustain free schools, free libraries, free lec- 
tures, and free presses, to become useful and exemplary members of so- 
ciety, and to die fit candidates for heaven. The magnanimous New 
Englander was in ecstasies with the prospect that opened before him. 
Individually, so far as mere money was concerned, he was perfectly in- 
dependent ; his industry and economy in early life had secured to him 
the ownership and control of an ample fortune. With the aid of eleven 
other men, each equal to himself, he could have bought the whole city of 
Richmond — negroes and all — though it is not to be presumed that he 
would have disgraced his name by becoming a trader in human flesh. 
But he was not selfish ; unlike the arrogant and illiberal slaveholder, he 
did not regard himself as the centre around whom everybody else should 
revolve. On the contrary, he was a genuine philanthropist. While, 
with a shrewdness that will command the admiration of every practical 
business man, he engaged in nothing that did not swell the dimensions 



56 COMPAKISOXS BETWEEN THE 

of Lis own purse, he was yet always solicitous to invest his capital in a 
manner calculated to promote the interests of those around him. Nor 
was he satisfied with simply furnishing the means whereby his less for- 
tunate neighbors were to become prosperous, intelligent and contented. 
"With his generous heart and sagacious mind, he delighted to aid them 
in making a judicious application of his wealth to their own use. More- 
over, as a member of society, he felt that the community had some rea- 
sonable claims upon him, and he made it obligatory on himself constant- 
ly to devise plans and exert his personal efforts for the public good. 
Such was the character of the distinguished manufacturer who honored 
Richmond with his presence twenty years since ; such was the character 
of the men whom he represented, and such were the grand designs which 
they sought to accomplish. 

To the enterprising and moneyed descendant of the Pilgrim Fathers it 
was a matter of no little astonishment, that the immense water-power 
of Eichmond had been so long neglected. He expressed his surprise to 
a number of Virginians, and was at a loss to know why they had not, 
long prior to the period of his visit amongst them, availed themselves of 
the powerful element that- is eternally gushing and foaming over the falls 
of James River. Innocent man ! He was utterly unconscious of the 
fact that he was " interfering with the beloved institutions of the South," 
and little was he prepared to withstand the terrible denunciations that 
were immediately showered on his head through the columns of the 
Richmond papers. Few words will suffice to tell the sequel. Those 
negro-driving sheets, whose hireling policy, for the last five and 
twenty years, has been to support the worthless black slave and his 
tyrannical master at the expense of the free white laborer, icrote doicn 
the enterjn'ise, and the noble son of New England, abused, insulted and 
disgusted, quietly returned to Massachusetts, and there employed his 
capital in building up the cities of Lowell and Lawrence, either of which, 
in all those elements of material and social prosperity that make up the 
greatness of States, is already far in advance of the most important of all 
the seedy and squalid slave-towns in the Old Dominion. Such is an ink- 
ling of the infamous means that have been resorted to, from time to 
time, for the purpose of upholding and perpetuating in America the 
accursed system of human slavery. 

How any rational man in this or any other country, w'ith the astound 
ing contrasts between Fi-eedom and Slavery ever looming in his view. 
can offer an apology for the existing statism of the South, is to us b 
most inexplicable mystery. Indeed, we cannot conceive it possible that 
the conscience of any man, who is really sane, would permit him to be- 
come the victim of such an egregious and diabolical absurdity. There- 
fore, at this period of our history, with the light of the past, the reality 
of the present, and the prospect of the future, all so prominent and sc 



FKEE AND THE SL^VE STATES. 57 

palpable, we infer that every person who sets up an unequivocal defence 
of the institution of slavery, must, of necessity, be either a fool, a knave, 
or a madman. 

It is much to be regretted that pro-slavery men look at but one side 
of the question. Of all the fanatics in the country, they have, of late, 
become the most unreasonable and ridiculous. Let them deliberately 
view the subject of slavery in all its aspects and bearings, and if they 
are possessed of honest hearts and convincible minds, they will readily 
perceive the grossness of their past errors, renounce their allegiance to 
a cause so unjust and disgraceful, and at once enroll themselves among 
the hosts of Freedom and the friends of universal Liberty. There are 
thirty-one States in the Union ; let them drop California, or any other 
new free State, and then institute fifteen comparisons, first comparing 
New York with Virginia, Pennsylvania with Carolina, Massachusetts 
with Georgia, and so on, until they have exhausted the catalogue. Then, 
for once, let them be bold enough to listen to the admonitions of their 
own souls, and if they do not soon start to their feet demanding the 
abolition of slavery, it will only be because they have reasons for sup- 
pressing their inmost sentiments. Whether we compare the old free 
States with the old slave States, or the new free States with the new 
slave States, the difference, unmistakable and astounding, is substantially 
the same. All the free States are alike, and all the slave States 
are alike. In the former, wealth, intelligence, power, progress, and 
prosperity, are the prominent characteristics ; in the latter, poverty, 
ignorance, imbecility, inertia, and extravagance, are the distinguishing 
features. To be convinced, it is only necessary for us to open our eyes 
and look at facts — to examine the statistics of the country, to free our- 
selves from obstinacy and prejudice, and to unbar our minds to the con- 
victions of truth. Let figures he the umpire. Close attention to the 
preceding and subsequent tables is all we ask ; so soon as they shall be 
duly considered and understood, the primary object of this work will 
have been accomplished. 

Not content with eating out the vitals of the South, slavery, in keep- 
ing with the character which it has acquired for insatiety and rapine, is 
beginning to make rapid encroachments on new territory ; and as a basis 
for a few remarks on the blasting influence which it is shedding over 
the broad and fertile domains of the West, which, in accordance with 
the views and resolutions off"ered by the immortal Jefferson, should 
have been irrevocably dedicated to freedom, we beg leave to call the 
attention of the reader to a plain, faithful presentation of the phi- 
losophy of free and slave labor. Says the North American and United 
States Gazette : 

" We have but to compare the States, possessing equal natural advantages, ve 
which the two kinds of labor are employed, in order to decide with entire confi 

3* 



58 COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 

dence as to whicli kind is the more profitable. At the origin of the government, 
Virginia, with a much larger extent of territory than New York, contained a popu- 
lation of seven hundred and fifty thousand, and sent ten representatives to Con- 
gress ; while New York contained a population of three hundred and forty thou- 
sand, and sent six representatives to Congress. Behold how the figures are 
reversed. The population of New York is three and a half millions, represented 
by thirty-three members in Congress; while the population of Virginia is but little 
more than one and a half millions, represented by thirteen members in Congress. 
It is the vital sap of free labor that makes the one tree so thrifty and vigorous, so 
capable of bearing with all ease the fruit of such a population. And it is slave 
labor which strikes a decadence through the other, drying up many of its branches 
with a fearful sterility, and rendering the rest but scantily fruitful ; reallj' incapable 
of sustaining more. Look at Ohio, teeming with inhabitants, its soil loaded with 
every kind of agricultural wealth, its people engaged in every kind of freedom's 
diversified employments, abounding with numberless happy homes, and with all 
the trophies of civilization, and it exhibits the magic effect of free labor, waking a 
wilderness into life and beauty ; while Kentucky, with equal or superior natural 
advantages, nature's very garden in this Western world, which commenced its 
career at a much earlier date, and was in a measure populous when Ohio was but 
a slumbering forest, but which in all the elements of progress, is now left far, very 
far, behind its young rival, shows how slave labor hinders the development of 
wealth among a people, and brings a blight on their prosperity. The one is a 
grand and beautiful poem in honor of free labor. The other is an humble confes- 
sion to the world of the inferiority of slave labor." 

Were we simply a freesoiler, or anything else less than a thorough and 
uncompromising abolitionist, we should certainly tax our ability to the 
utmost to get up a cogent argument against the extension of slavery over 
any part of our domain where it does not now exist ; but as our prin- 
ciples are hostile to the institution even where it does exist, and, there- 
fore, by implication and in fact, more hostile stUl to its introduction into 
new territory, we forbear the preparation of any special remarks on this 
particular subject. 

With regard to the unnational and demoralizing system of slavery, we 
believe the majority of Northern people are too scrupulous. They seem 
to think that it is enough for them to be mere freesoilers, to keep in 
check the diffusive element of slavery, and to prevent it from crossing 
over the bounds within which it is now regulated by municipal law. 
Remiss in their national duties, as we contend, they make no positive 
attack upon the institution in the Southern States. Only a short while 
since, one of their ablest journals— the North American and United 
States Gazette, published in Philadelphia — made use of the following 
language : 

"With slavery in the States, we make no pretence of having anything politically 
to do. For better or for worse, the system belongs solely to the people of those 
States ; and is separated by an impassable gulf of State sovereignty from any legal 
intervention of ours. We cannot vote it down any more than we can vote down 
the institution of caste in Hindostan, or abolish polygamy in the Sultan's dominions. 
Thus, precluded from all political action in reference to it, prevented from touching 
one stone of the edifice, not the slightest responsibility attaches to us as citizens 
for its continued existence. But on the question of extending slavery over the 
free Territories of the United States, it is our right, it is our imperative duty to 
think, to feel, to speak and to vote. We cannot interfere to cover the shadows of 
slavery with the sunshine of freedom, but we can interfere to prevent the sunshine 
of freedom from being eclipsed by the shadows of slavery. We can interpose to 
Btay the progress of that institution, which aims to drive free labor from its own 
heritage. Kansas should be divided up into countless homes for the ownership of 



FKEE ANl) lUE SLAVE STATES. 59 

men who have a right to the fruit of their own labors. Free labor would make it 
bud aad blossom like the rose ; would cover it with beauty, and draw from it 
boundless wealth; would throng it with population; would make States, nations, 
empires out of it. prosperous, powerful, intelligent and free, illustrating on a wide 
theatre the beneticent ends of Providence in the formation of our government, to 
advance and elevate the millions of our race, and, like the heart in the body, from 
its central position, sending out on every side, far and near, the vital influences of 
freedom and civilization. May that region, therefore, be secured to free labor." 

Now we fully and heartily indorse every line of the latter part of this 
e.xtract; but, with all due deference to our sage contemporary, we do 
most emphatically dissent from the sentiments embodied in the first part. 
Pray, permit us to ask — have the people of the North no interest in tlie 
United States as a nation, and do they not see that slavery is a great 
injury and disgrace to the whole country ? Did they not, in " the days 
that tried men's souls," strike as hard blows to secure the independence 
of Georgia as they did in defending the liberties of Massachusetts, and is 
it not notoriously true that the Toryism of South Carolina prolonged the 
war two years at least? Is it not, moreover, equally true that the 
oligarchs of South Carolina have been unmitigated pests and bores to the 
General Government ever since it was organized, and that the free and 
conscientious people of the Xorth are virtually excluded from her soil, 
in consequence of slavery ? It is a well-known and incontestable fact, 
that the Northern States furnished about two-thirds of all the American 
troops engaged in the Eevolutionary War; and, though they were 
neither more nor less brave or patriotic than their fellow-soldiers of the 
South, yet, inasmuch as the independence of our country was mainly 
secured by virtue of their numerical strength, we think they ought to 
consider it not only their right but their duty to make a firm and deci- 
sive effort to save the States which they fought to free, from falling 
under the yoke of a worse tyranny than that which overshadowed them 
under the reign of King George the Third. Freemen of the North ! we 
earnestly entreat you to think of these things. Hitherto, as mere free- 
soilers, you have approached but half-way to the line of your duty ; now, 
fur your own sakes and for ours, and for the purpose of perpetuating 
this great Republic, which your fathers and our fathers founded in sep- 
tennial streams of blood, we ask you, in all seriousness, to organize your- 
selves as one man under the banners of Liberty, and to aid us in exter- 
minating slavery, which is the only thing that militates against our 
complete aggrandizement as a nation. 

In this extraordinary crisis of affairs, no man can be a true patriot 
without first becoming an abolitionist. And here, perJiaps, we may be 
jjardoued for the digression necessary to show the exact definition of 
the terms abolish, abolition, abolitionist. We have looked in vain for 
an explanation of the signification of these words in any Southern pub- 
lii^ation ; for no dictionary has ever yet been published in the South, nor 
\f there the least probali^ity that one ever will be published within her 



60 coMPAKisoNS betwep:n the 

borders, until slavery is abolkhed; but, thanks to Heaven, a portion of 
tliis continent is what our Eevolutionary Fathers, and the Fathers of 
the Constitution, fought and labored and prayed to make it — a land of 
tl*eedom, of power, of progress, of prosperity, of intelligence, of reli- 
gion, of literature, of commerce, of science, of arts, of agriculture, of 
manufactures, of ingenuity, of enterprise, of wealth, of renown, of 
goodness, and of grandeur. From that glorious part of our confederacy 
— from the North, whence, on account of slavery in the South, we are 
under the humiliating necessity of procuring almost everything that is 
useful or ornamental, from primers to Bibles, from wafers to printing- 
presses, from ladles to locomotives, and from portfolios to portraits and 
pianos — comes to us a huge volume bearing the honored name of Web- 
ster — jSToah Webster, Avho, after thirty -five years of unremitting toil, 
completed a work which is, we believe, throughout Great Britain and 
the United States, justly regarded as the standard vocabulary of the 
English language — and in it the terms abolish^ abolition, and ahoUtiotiists, 
are defined as follows : 

" Abolish, V. «. To make void ; to annul; to abrogate; applied cliiefly and 
appropriately to establislied laws, contracts, rites, customs and institutions ; as to 
abolish laws by a repeal, actual or virtual. To destroy or put an end to ; as to 
abolish idols." 

" Abolition, n. The act of abolishing ; or the state of being abolished; an 
annulling ; abrogation ; utter destruction ; as the abolition of laws, decrees, 
ordinances, rites, customs, etc. The putting an end to slavery ; emancipation." 

" Abolitionist, n. A person who favors abolition, or the immediate emancipation 
of slaves." 

There, gentlemen of the South, you have the definitions of the trans- 
itive verb dbolisTi, and its two derivative nouns, alolition and abolition- 
ist ; can you, with the keenest possible penetration of vision, detect in 
either of these words even a tittle of the opprobrium which the 
oligarchs, in their wily and inhuman efforts to enslave all working 
classes irrespective of race or color, have endeavored to attach to them ? 
We know you cannot ; abolition is but another name for patriotism, and 
its other special synonyms are generosity, magnanimity, reason, prudence, 
wisdom, religion, progress, justice and humanity. 

" Non-slaveholders of the South ! farmers, mechanics and workingmen, 
iwe take this occasion to assure you that the slaveholding politicians 
whom you have elected to olfices of honor and profit, have hoodwinked 
you, trifled with you, and used you as mere tools for the consummation of 
their wicked designs. They have purposely kept you in ignorance, and 
have, by molding your passions and prejudices to suit themselves, 
induced you to act in direct opposition to your dearest rights and inte- 
rests. By a system of the grossest subterfuge and misrepresentation, and 
in order to avert, for a season, the vengeance that will most assuredly 
overtake them ere long, they have taught you to hate the lovers of 
liberty, who are your best and only true friends. Now, as one of your 



FREE AND THE SLAVE STATES. 6l 

own number, we appeal to you to join us in our earnest and timely efforts 
to rescue the generous soil of the South from the usurped and desolating 
control of these political vampires. Once and forever, at least so far as 
this country is concerned, the infernal question of slavery must be dis- 
posed of; a speedy and absolute abolishment of the whole system is 
the true policy of the South — and this is the policy which we propose 
to pursue. Will you aid us, wiU you assist us, will you be freemen, or 
will you be slaves ? These are questions of vital importance ; weigh 
them well in your minds; come to a prudent and firm decision,, and 
hold yourselves in readiness to act in accordance therewith. You must 
either be for us or against us — anti-slavery or pi-o-slavery ; it is impossi- 
ble for you to occupy a neutral ground ; it is as certain as fate itself, that 
if you do not voluntarily oppose the usurpations and outrages of the 
slavocrats, they will force you into involuntary compliance with their 
infamous measures. Consider well the aggressive, fraudulent and despo- 
tic power which they have exercised in the affairs of Kansas ; and 
remember that, if, by adhering to erroneous principles of neutrality or 
non-resistance, you allow them to force the curse of slavery on that or 
any other vast and fertile field, the broad area of aU the surrounding 
States and Territories — the whole nation, in fact — will soon fall a prey 
to their diabolical intrigues and machinations. Thus, if you are not 
vigilant, will they take advantage of your neutrality, and make you and 
others the victims of their inhuman despotism. Do not reserve the 
strength of your arms until you shall have been rendered powerless to 
strike ; the present is the proper time for action ; under all the circum- 
stances, apathy or indifference is a crime. First ascertain, as nearly as 
you can, the precise nature and extent of your duty, and then, without 
a moment's delay, perform it in good faith. To facilitate you in deter- 
mining what considerations of right, justice and humanity require f.t 
your hands, is one of the primary objects of this work ; and we shall 
certainly fail in our desire if we do not accomplish our task in a manner 
acceptable to God and advantageous to man. 

But we are carrying this chapter beyond all ordinary bounds ; and 
yet, there are many important particulars in which we have drawn no 
comparison between the free and slave States. The more weighty 
remarks which we intended to offer in relation to the new States of the 
West and Southwest, free and slave, shall appear in the succeeding chap- 
ter. With regard to agriculture, and all the multifarious interests of 
husbandry, we deem it quite unnecessary to say more. Cotton has been 
shorn of its magic power, and is no longer King; dried grass, com- 
monly called hay, is, it seems, the rightful heir to the throne. Com- 
merce, Manufactures, Literature, and other important subjects, shall be 
considered as we progress. 



CHAPTER II. 

HOW SLAVERY OAN BE ABOLISHED. 

Our age, marked by restless activity in almost all departments of knowledge, and by 
itruggles and aspirations before unknown, is stamped by no characteristic more deeply than 

by a desire to establish or extend freedom in the political societies of mankind 

There are many persons who pretend to admire liberty, but withhold it from the people on 
the plea that they are not prepared for it. Unquestionably, all races are not prepared for 
the same amount of liberty. But two things are certain, that all nations, and especially 
those belonging to our own civilized family, prove that they are prepared for the beginning 
of liberty, by desiiing it and insisting upon it and that you cannot otherwise prepare nations 
for enjoying liberty than by beginning to establish it, as you best prepare nations for a high 
Christianity by beginning to preach it.— Liebek. 

Peeliminary to our elucidation of what we conceive to be the most 
discreet, fair and feasible plan for the abolition of slavery, we propose 
to offer a few additional reasons why it should be abolished. Among 
the thousand and one arguments that present themselves in support of 
our position — which, before we part with the reader, we shall endeavor 
to define so clearly, that it shall be regarded as ultra only by those who 
imperfectly understand it — is the influence which slavery invariably 
exercises in depressing the value of real estate ; and as this is a matter 
in which the non-slaveholders of the South, of the "West, and of the 
Southwest, are most deeply interested, we shall discuss it in a sort of 
preamble of some length. 

The slaveholding oligarchy say we cannot abolish slavery without 
infringing on the right of property. Again we tell them we do not 
recognize property in men ; but even if we did, and if we were to 
inventory the negroes at quadruple the value of their last assessment, 
still, impelled by a sense of duty to others, and as a matter of simple 
justice, to ourselves, we, the non-slaveholders of the South, would be 
fully warranted in emancipating all the slaves at once, and that, too, 
without any compensation whatever to those who claim to be their 
absolute masters and owners. We will explain. In 1850, the average 
value per acre, of land in the Northern States was $28 07 ; in the 
Northwestern $1139; in the Southern $5 34; and in the Southwes- 
tern $6 26. Now, in consequence of numerous natural advantages, 
among which may be enumerated the greater miliiiess of climate, rich- 
ness of soil, deposits of precious metals, abundance, and spaciousness of 
harbors, and superexcellence of water-power, we contend that, had it 
not been for slavery, the average value of land in all the Southern and 



HOW SLAVEKY CAN BE ABOLISHED. G3 

Southwestern States, would have been at least equal to the average 
value of the same in the Northern States. We conclude, therefore, and 
we think the conclusion is founded on principles of equity, that 
you, the slaveholders, are indebted to us, the non-slaveholders, in the 
sum of $22 73, which is the difference between $28 07 and $5 34, on 
every acre of Southern soil in our possession. This claim we bring 
against you, because slavery, which has inured exclusively to your own 
benefit, if, indeed, it has been beneficial at all, has shed a blighting influ- 
ence over our lands, thereby keeping them out of market, and damaging 
every acre to the amount specified. Sirs ! are you ready to settle the 
account? Let us see how much it is. There are in the fifteen slave 
States, 346,048 slaveholders, and 544,926,720 acres of land. Now the 
object is to ascertain how many acres are owned by slaveholders, and 
how many by non-slaveholders. Suppose we estimate five hundred 
acres as the average landed property of each slaveholder ; will tliat be 
fair ? We think it will, taking into consideration the fact that 174,503 
of the whole number of slaveholders hold less than five slaves each — 
68,820 holding only one each. According to this hypothesis, the slave- 
holders own 173,024,000 acres, and the non-slaveholders the balance, 
with the exception of about 40,000,000 of acres which belong to the 
General Government. The case may be stated thus : 

Area of the Slave States 544,926,720 acres. 

( Acres owned by slaveholders 173,024,000 

Estimates \ Acres owned by the government 40,000,000=213,024,000 

(Acres owned by non-slaveholders 331,902,720 

Now, chevaliers of the lash, and conservators of slavery, the total 
value of three hundred and thirty- one million nine hundred and two 
thousand seven hundred and twenty acres, at twenty-two dollars and 
seventy-three cents per acre, is seven lillion Jive Jmnclred and forty -four 
million one hundred and forty-eight thousand eight hundred and 
twenty -five dollars; and this is our account against you on a single 
score. Considering how your pernicious institution has retarded 
the development of our commercial and manufacturing interests, how it 
has stifled the aspirations of inventive genius; and, above all, how it 
has barred from us the heaven-born sweets of literature and religion- 
concernments too sacred to be estimated in a pecuniary point of view- 
might we not, with perfect justice and propriety, duplicate the amount, 
and still be accounted modest in our demands ? Fully advised, however, 
of your indigent circumstances, we feel it would be utterly useless to 
call on you for the whole amount that is due us ; we shall, therefore, in 
your behalf, make another draft on the fund of non-slaveholding gener- 
osity, and let the account, meagre as it is, stand as above. Though we 
have given you all the offices, and you have given us none of the bene- 



64 now SLAVERY CAN BE AUOLISUED. 

fits of legislation; though we have fought the battles of the South, 
while you were either lolling in your piazzas, or in active fellowship 
with the enemy, and endeavoring to filch from us our birthright of free- 
dom ; though you have absorbed the wealth of our communities in send- 
ing your own children to Northern seminaries and colleges, or in 
employing Yankee teachers to oflSciate exclusively in your own families, 
and have refused to us the limited privilege of common schools ; though 
you have scorned to patronize our mechanics and industrial enterprises, 
and have passed to the North for every article of apparel, utility, and 
adornment ; and though you have maltreated, outraged and defrauded us 
in every relation of life, civil, social, and political, yet we are willing to 
forgive and forget you, if you will but do us justice on a single count. 
Of you, the introducers, aiders and abettors of slavery, we demand 
indemnification for the damage our lands have sustained on account 
thereof; the amount of that damage is $7,544,148,825 ; and now, sirs, 
we are ready to receive the money, and if it is perfectly convenient to 
you, we would be glad to have you pay it in specie ! It will not avail 
you, sirs, to parley or prevaricate. "We must have a settlement. Our 
claim is just and overdue. We have already indulged you too long. 
Your reckless extravagance has almost ruined us. We are determined 
that you shall no longer play the profligate, and fare sumptuously every 
day at our expense. Uow do you propose to settle ? Do you oflier us 
your negroes in part payment? We do not want your negroes. We would 
not have all of them, nor any number of them, even as a gift. We hold 
ourselves above the disreputable and iniquitous practices of buying, 
selling, and owning slaves. What we demand is damages in money, or 
other absolute property, as an equivalent for the pecuniary losses we 
have suflTered at your hands. You value your negroes at sixteen hun- 
dred millions of dollars, and propose to sell them to us for that sum ; we 
should consider ourselves badly cheated, and disgraced for all time, 
here and hereafter, if we were to take them olf your hands at sixteen 
farthings ! We tell you emphatically, we are firmly resolved never to 
degrade ourselves by becoming the mercenary purchasers or jiroprietors 
of human beings. Except for the purpose of liberating them, we would 
not give a handkerchief or a tooth-pick for all the slaves in the world. 
But, in order to show how ridiculously absurd are the howls and groans 
which you invariably setup for compensation, whenever we speak of the 
uliolition of .slavery, we will suppose your negroes are worth all you ask 
for them, and that wo are bound to secure to you every cent of the sum 
before they can become free — in which case, our accounts would stand 
thus : 

Non-slavehohlers' account against Slaveholders $7,544,148,825 

Slaveholdors' account against Non-slaveholders 1,600,000,000 

Balance due Noa-Blaveliolders $5,944,148^25 



HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 65 

Now, Sirs, we ask you in all seriousness, Is it not apparent that you 
have filched from us nearly five times the amount of the assessed value 
of your slaves ? Why, then, do you still clamor for more ? Is it your 
purpose to make the game perpetual? Think you that we will ever 
continue to bow at the wave of your wand, that we will bring humanity 
into everlasting disgrace by licking the hand that smites us, and that 
with us there is no point beyond which forbearance ceases to be a vir- 
tue ? Sirs, if these be your thoughts, you are laboring under a most 
fatal delusion. You can goad us no further ; you shall oppress us no 
longer ; heretofore, earnestly but submissively, we have asked you to 
redress the more atrocious outrages which you have perpetrated against 
us; but what has been the invariable fate of our petitions? "With 
scarcely a perusal, with a degree of contempt that added insult to injury, 
you have laid them on the table, and from thence they have been swept 
into the furnace of oblivion. Henceforth, Sirs, we are demandants, not 
suppliants. We demand our rights, nothing more, nothing less. It is 
for you to decide whether we are to have justice peaceably or by vio- 
lence, for whatever consequences may follow, we are determined to have 
it one way or the other. 

Slavery has polluted and impoverished your lands ; freedom will 
restore them to their virgin purity, and add from twenty to thirty dol- 
lars to the value of every acre. Correctly speaking, emancipation will 
cost you nothing ; the moment you abolish slavery, that very moment 
will the putative value of the slave become actual value in the soil. 
Though there are ten millions of people in the South, and though you the 
slaveholders are only three hundred and forty-seven thousand in number, 
you have within a fraction of one-third of all the territory belonging to 
the fifteen slave States. You have a landed estate of 173,024,000 acres, 
the present average market value of which is only $5 34 per acre ; eman- 
cipate your slaves on Wednesday morning, and on the Thursday follow- 
ing the value of your lands, and ours too, will have increased to an aver- 
age of at least $28 07 per acre. Let us see, therefore, even in this one 
particular, whether the abolition of slavery will not be a real pecuniary 
advantage to you. The present total market value of all your landed pro- 
perty, at $5 34 per acre, is only $923,248,160. With the beauty and 
sunlight of freedom beaming on the same estate, it would be wortk at 
$28 07 per acre, $4,856,873,680! The former sum, deducted from the 
latter, leaves a balance of $3,933,535,520, and to the full extent of this 
amount wQl your lands be increased in value whenever you abolisl: sla- 
very ; that is, provided you abolish it before it completely " dries up all 
the organs of increase." Here is a more manifest and distinct statement 
of the case : 



66 UOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

Estimated value of slaveholders' lands after slavery shall I ^ ggg 1^33 ggQ 

have been abolished j ' ' ' 

Present value of slaveholders' lands 923,248,160 

Probable aggregate enhancement of value $3,933,535,520 

Now, Sirs, this last sura is considerably more than twice as great as 
the estimated value of all your negroes ; and those of you, if any there 
be, who are yet heirs to sane minds and generous hearts, must, it seems 
to us, admit that the bright prospect which freedom presents for a won- 
derful increase in the value of real estate, ours as well as yours, to say 
nothing of tlie thousand other kindred considerations, ought to be quite suf- 
ficient to induce all the Southern States, in their sovereign capacities, to 
abolish slavery at the earliest practicable period. You yourselves, 
instead of losing anything by the emancipation of your negroes — even 
though we suppose them to be worth every dime of $1,600,000,000, would, 
in this one particular, the increased value of land, realize a net profit of 
over twenty-three hundred million of dollars. Here are the exact figures : 

Net increment of value -n-hich itis estimated will accrue to] 

slaveholders' lands in consequence of the abolition > $3,933,535,520 
of slavery ) 

Putative value of the slaves 1,600,000,000 

Slaveholders' estimated net landed profits of emancipation $2,333,535,520 

"What is the import of these figures? They are full of meaning. They 
proclaim themselves the financial intercessors for freedom, and, with that 
open-hearted liberality which is so characteristic of the sacred cause in 
wliose behalf tliey plead, they propose to pay you upward of three 
thousand nine hundred million of dollars for the very " property" which 
yoa, in all the extravagance of your unchastened avarice, could not find 
a heart to price at more than one thousand six hundred million. In 
other words, your own lands, groaning and languishing under the mon- 
strous burden of slavery, announce their willingness to pay you all you 
ask for tlie negroes, and offer you, besides, a bonus of more than twenty- 
three hundred million of dollars, if you will but convert those lands into 
free soil! Our lands, also, cry aloud to be spared from the further pollu- 
tions and desolations of slavery; and now, sirs, we want to know 
explicitly whether, or not, it is your intention to heed these lamentations 
of the ground ? We, the non-slaveholders of the South, have many very 
important interests at stake— interests which, heretofore, you have stead- 
ily despised and trampled under foot, but which, henceforth, we shall 
foster and defend in utter deliance of all the unliullowed influences which 
it is pi»s>ibie for you, or any other class of slaveholders or slavebreeders 
to bring against us. Not tlie least among these interests is our landed 
property, wiiich, tc command a decent price, only needs to be disencum- 
bered of slavery. 



HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 67 

In his present condition, -we believe, man exercises one of the noblest 
virtues with which heaven has endowed him, when without taking any 
undue advantage of his fellow-men, and with a firm, unwavering purpose 
to confine his expenditures to the legitimate pursuits and pleasures of 
life, he covets money and strives to accumulate it. Entertaining this 
view, and having no disposition to make an improper use of money, we 
are free to confess that we have a greater penchant for twenty-eight dol- 
lars than for five ; for ninety than for fifteen ; for a thousand than for one 
hundred. South of Mason and Dixon's line we, the non-slaveholders, 
have 331,902,720 acres of land, the present average market value of 
which, as previously stated, is only $5 34 per acre ; by abolishing slavery 
we expect to enhance the value to an average of at least $28 07 per acre, 
and thus realize an average net increase of wealth of more than seventy- 
five liundred million of dollars. The hope of realizing smaller sums has 
frequently induced men to perpetrate acts of injustice ; we can see no 
reason why the certainty of becoming immensely rich in real estate, or 
other property, sliould make us falter in the performance of a sacred 
duty. 

As illustrative of our theme, a bit of personal history may not be out 
of place in this connectiou. Only a few months have elapsed since we 
sold to an elder brother an interest we held in an old homestead which 
was willed to us many years ago by our deceased father. The tract of 
land, containing two hundred acres, or thereabouts, is situated two and 
a half miles west of Mocksville, the capital of Davie county, North Caro- 
lina, and is very nearly equally divided by Bear Creek, a small tribu- 
tary of the South Yadkin. More than one-third of this tract— on which 
we have ploughed,and hoed, andharrowed, many along summer without 
ever suffering from the effects of coup de soleil—\s under cultivation ; 
the remaining portion is a well-timbered forest, in which, without being 
very particular, we counted, while hunting through it not long since, 
sixty-three different kinds of indigenous trees— to say nothing of either 
coppice, shrabs or plants — among which the hickory, oak, ash, beech, 
birch, and black walnut, were most abundant. No turpentine or rosin, 
is produced in our part of the State ; but there are, on the place of which 
we speak, several species of the genus Pinus, by the light of whose flam- 
mable knots, as radiated on the contents of some half-dozen old books 
which, by hook or by crook, had found their way into the neigliborhood, 
we have been enabled to turn the long winter evenings to some advantage, 
and have thus partially escaped from the prison-grounds of those loath- 
some dungeons of illiteracy in which it has been the constant policy of 
the oligarchy to keep the masses, the non-slaveholding whites and the 
negroes, forever confined. The fertility of the soil may be inferred from 
the quality and variety of its natural productions ; the meadow and the 
bottom, comprising, perhaps, an era of forty acres, are hardly surpassed 



68 UOW SLAVEUV CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

by the best lands in the vallej- of the Yadkin. A thorough examination 
of the orchard will disclose the fact that considerable attention has been 
paid to the selection of fruits ; tlie buildings are tolerable ; the water is 
good. Altogether, to be frank, and nothing more, it is, for its size, one 
of the most desirable farms in the country, and will, at any time, com- 
mand the maximum price of land in Western Carolina. Our brother, 
anxious to become the sole proprietor, readily agreed to give us the 
highest market price, which we shall publish by and bye. While read- 
ing the Baltimore Sun, the morning after we had made the sale, our 
attention was allured to a paragraph headed " Sales of Eeal Estate," 
from which, among other significant items, we learned that a tract of 
land containing exactly two hundred acres, and occupying a portion of 
one of the rural districts in the southeastern part of Pennsylvania, near 
the Maryland line, had been sold the week before, at one httndred and 
five dollars and fifty cenU per acre. Judging from the succinct account 
given in the Sun, we are of the opinion that, with regard to fertility of 
soil, the Pennsylvania tract always has been, is now, and perhaps always 
will be, rather inferior to the one under special consideration. One is 
of the same size as the other ; both are used for agricultural purposes ; 
in all probability the only essential difference between them is this : one 
is blessed with the pure air of freedom, the other is cursed with the 
malaria of slavery. For our interest in the old homestead we received a 
nominal sum, amounting to an average of precisely j?cc dollars and sixty 
cents Yier acre. No one but our brother, who was keen for the purchase, 
would have given us quite so much. 

And now, pray let us ask, what does this narrative teach? We shall 
use few words in explanation ; there is an extensive void, but it can be 
better filled with reflection. The aggregate value of the one tract is 
$21,100 ; that of the other is only $1,120 ; the difference is $19,980. We 
contend, therefore, in view of all the circumstances detailed, that the ad- 
vocates and retainers of slavery, have, to all intents and purposes, 
defrauded our family out of this last-mentioned sum. In like manner, 
and on the same basis of deduction, we contend that almost every non- 
slaveholder, who either is or has been the owner of real estate in tie 
South, would in a court of strict justice, be entitled to damages — the 
amount in all cases to be determined with reference to the quality of the 
land in question. We say this, because in violation of every principle of 
expediency, justice, and humanity, and in direct opposition to our solemn 
protests, slavery was foisted upon us, and has been thus far perpetuated 
by and through the wily intrigues of the oligarchy, and by them alone ; 
and furtliermorc, because the very best agricultural lands in the N'ortbern 
States being worth from one hundred to one hundred and seventy-five 
dollars per acre, there is no possible reason, except slavery, why the 
more fertile and congenial soil of the South should not be worth at least 



now SLAVKRY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 69 

as much. If, on this principle, we could ascertain, in the matter of real 
estate, the total indebtedness of the slaveholders to the non-slaveholders, 
we should doubtless find the sum quite equivalent to the amount esti- 
mated on a preceding page— -$7,54:4,148,825. 

We have recently conversed with two gentlemen who, to save them- 
selves from the poverty and disgrace of slavery, left North Carolina six 
or seven years ago, and who are now residing in the territory of Minne- 
sota, where they have accumulated handsome fortunes. One of them 
had travelled extensively in Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, Indiana, and 
other adjoining States ; and, according to his account, and we know him 
to be a man of veracity, it is almost impossible for persons at a distance, 
to form a proper conception of the magnitude of the difierence between 
the current value of lands in the Free and the Slave States of the West. 
On one occasion, embarking at Wheeling, he sailed down the Ohio; 
Virginia and Kentucky on the one side, Ohio and Indiana on the other. 
He stopped at several places along the river, first on the right bank, 
then on the left, and so on, until he arrived at Evansville ; continuing 
his trip, he sailed down to Cairo, thence up the Mississippi to the mouth 
of the Des Moines ; having tarried at different points along the route, 
sometimes in Missouri, sometiines in Illinois. Wherever he landed on 
free soil, he found it from one to two hundred per cent, more valuable 
than the slave soil on the opposite bank. If, for instance, the maximum 
price of land was eight dollars in Kentucky, the minimum price was 
sixteen in Ohio ; if it was seven dollars in Missouri, it was fourteen in 
Illmois. Furthermore, he assured us, that, so far as he could learn, two 
years ago, when he travelled through the States of which we speak, the 
range of prices of agricultural lands, in Kentucky, was from three to 
eight dollars per acre ; in Ohio, from sixteen to forty ; in Missouri, from 
two to seven; in Illinois, from fourteen to thirty; in Arkansas, from 
one to four ; in Iowa, from six to fifteen. 

In all the old slave States, as is well known, there are vast bodies of 
land that can be bought for the merest trifle. We know an enterprising 
capitalist in Philadelphia, who owns in his individual name, in the State 
of Virginia, one hundred and thirty thousand acres, for which he paid 
only thirty-seven and a half cents per acre ! Some years ago, in certain 
parts of North Carolina, several large tracts were purchased at the rate 
of twenty-five cents per acre ? 

Hiram Berdan, the distinguished inventor, who has frequently seen 
freedom and slavery side by side, and who is, therefore, well qualified to 
form an opinion of their relative influence upon society, says : 



"Many comparisons mijrht be drawn between the free and the slave States, 
either of wliic!i should be sufficient to satisfy any man that slavery is not only ruin- 
ons to free labor and enterprise, but injurious to morals, and bhghtmg to tlie soil 
wht-re it exists. The comparison between the States of Michigan and Arkansas, 
wb -h were admitted into the Union at the same time, will tairly il.u=traue tue 



70 now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

difTcrence and value of free and slave labor, as well as the difference of moral ami 
intellectual progress in a free and in a slave State. 

" In l.'S3G, those j-oung Stars were admitted into the constellation of the Union. 
Michigan, with one-half the extent of territory of Arkansas, challenged her sister 
State for a twenty years' race, and named as'hcr rider, 'Neither slavery, nor in- 
voluntary servitude, unless for the punishment of crime, shall ever be tolerated in 
this State.' Arkansas accejited the challenge, and named as her rider, 'The 
General Assembly shall have no power to pass laws for the emancipation of slaves 
without the consent of the owners.' Thns mounted, these two States, the one free 
and the other slave, started together twenty years ago, and now, having arrived at 
the end of the j)roposed race, let us revii'W and mark the progress of each. 
Michigan comes out in 1856 with three times the population of slave Arkansas, with 
live times the assessed value of farms, faiming imikmcnls and machinery, and 
with eight times the number of public schools." 

In the foregoing part of our work, -vve have drawn comparisons be- 
tween the old free States and the old slave States, and between the new 
free States and the new slave States ; had we sufficient time and space, 
we might with the most significant results, change this method of com- 
parison, by contrasting the new free States with the old slave States. 
Can the slavery-extensionists compare Ohio with Virginia, Illinois with 
Georgia, or Indiana with South Carolina, without experiencing the agony 
of inexpressible shame? If they can, then indeed lias slavery debased 
tliein to a lower deep than we care to contemplate. 

We shall now introduce two tables of valuable and interesting 
statistics, to which philosophic and discriminating readers will doubt- 
less have frequent occasions to refer. Table 11 will show the area 
of tlie several States, in square miles and in acres, and the number 
of iniiabitants to the square mile in each State; also the grand total, or 
the average, of every statistical column; table 12 will exhibit the total 
number of inhabitants residing in each State, according to the census of 
1850, the number of whites, the number of free colored, and the num- 
ber of slaves. The recapitulations of these tables will be followed by a 
complete list of the number of slaveholders in the United States, show- 
ing the exact number in each Southern State, and in the District of 
Columbia. Most warmly do we commend all these statistics to the 
studious attention of the reader. Their language is more eloquent than 
any possible combination of Roman vowels and consonants. We have 
spared no pains in arranging them so as to express at a single glance the 
great truths of which they are composed ; and we doubt not that the 
jilan we have adopted will meet with general approbation. Numerically 
considered, it will be perceived that the slaveholders are, in reality, a 
very insignificant class. Of them, however we shall have more to say 
hereafter. 



HOW SLAVERY CAJST BE ABOLISHED. 



71 



T.AJBIL.E 11. 

AREA OF THB FREE AND OF THE SLATE STATES. 



AREA OF THE FREE STATES. 


AREA OF THE SLAVE STATES. 


States. 


Square 
Miles. 


Acres. 


Inhabitants 
to sq. mile. 


States. 


Square 
Miles. 


Acres. 


Inhabitants 
t . sq. mile. 


California 


155,930 


99,827,200 


.59 


Alabama 


50,722 


32,027,490 


15.21 


Conn 


4,674 


2,991,360 


79.3;3 


Arkansas 


52,198 


-33,40(;,720 


4.02 


Illinois. . . 


55,405 


35,359,200 


15.37 


Delaware 


2,120 


1,356,800 


43.18 


Indiana.. 


33,SU9 


21,687,760 


29.24 


Florida.. 


59,268 


37,931,520 


1.48 


Iowa 


50,914 


32,584,960 


3.78 


Georgia . 


58,000 


37,120,000 


15.62 


Maine. . . . 


31,766 


20,330,240 


18.36 


Kentucky 


37,680 


24,115,200 


26.07 


Mass 


7,800 


4,992,000 


127.50 


Louisiana! 41,255 


86,403,2110 


12.55 


Michigan. 


56,243 


35,995,520 


7.07 


Maryland] 11,124 


7,119,360 


52.41 


N. Uamp. 


9,2>0 


5,939,200 


34.26 


Miss 


47,156 


30,179,840 


12.86 


N. Jersey- 


8,320 


5,324,800 


5S 84 


Missouri. 


67,380 


43,123,200 


10.12 


New York 


47,000 


30,080,000 


65.90 


N.C 


50,704 


32,450,560 


17.14 


Ohio 


39,964 


26,576,9.J0 


49.55 


S. C 1 29,385 


18,805,400 


22.75 


Penn 


46,000 


29,440,000 


50.26 


Tenn. ... 1 45, 6^0 


29,184,000 


21.99 


Rhode Is. 


1,306 


835,840 


112.97 


Texas... 237,.504 


152,002,560 


.89 


Vermont. 


10,312 


6,.535,6S0 


80.76 


Virginia. : 61,352 


39,165,280 


23.17 


Wisconsin 


53,924 


34,511,860 


5.66 












612,597 


392,062,080 


21.91 


851,443 


544,926,720 


11.29 



T^BLE 13. 

POPULATION OF THE FREE AND OF THE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



POFUL.-VTIOX OF THE FREE STATES— | 


POPULATION OF 


THE SLAVE STATICS— 




1850. 








1830. 






States. 


Whites. 


Free 
Colored. 


Total. 


States. 


Whites. 


Free 
Colored. 


Slaves. 


Total. 


California 


91,635 


962 


92,597 


Alabama 


426,514 


2,265 


342,844 


771,628 


Conn 


363,099 


7,693 


370,792 


Arkansas 


162,189 


608 


47,100 


209,897 


Illinois. .. 


846,034 


5,436 


851,470 


Delaware 


71,169 


18,073 


2,290 


91 ,532 


Indiana.. 


977,154 


11,262 


988,416 


Florida . 


47,203 


932 


-89,310 


87,445 


Iowa 


191,881 


333 


192,214 


Georgia. 


521,572 


2,931 


381,622 


906,18.) 


Maine .. . 


581,813 


1,-356 


583,169 


Kentucky 


761,413 


10,011 


210,981 


982,405 


Mass 


985,450 


9,064 


994,514 


Louisiana 


255,491 


17,462 


244,809 


51T,Ti:2 


Michigan. 


895,071 


2,583 


397,654 


Maryland 


417,943 


74,723 


90,368 


583,034 


N. Hamp. 


317,456 


520 


817,976 


Miss 


295,718 


930 


809.878 


606,-326 


N. Jersey 


465,609 


23,810 


489,.555 


Missouri. 


592,004 


2,618 


87,422 




New York 


3,048,325 


49,069 


8,097,394 


N. C. ... 


553,028 


27,463 


288,548 




Ohio 


1,955,050 


25,279 


1,980,329 


S. c. ... 


274,563 


8,960 


884,984 




Penn 


2,258,160 


53,626 


2,311,786 


Tenn. ... 


756,836 


6,422 


239,4.59 


1,002,717 


Rhode Is. 


143,875 


8,670 


147,.545 


Texas . . . 


1.54,0-34 


897 


58,161 




Vermont.. 


313,402 


718 


314,120 


Virginia. 


894,800 


54,833 


472,5j8 


1,421,661 


Wisconsia 


804,756 


535 


805,391 














18,233,670 

1 


196,116 


13,434,922 


«,184,47T 


228,138 


g,200,8&4 


9,612,979 



72 now SLAVEKY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 



RECAPITULATION — AREA. 

Square Miles. Awes. 

Area Of the Slave States 851,448 ^JffiS 

Area of the Free States 612,597 392,062,082 

Balances in favor of Slave States, 238,851 152,864,638 



RECAPITULATION — POPULATION 1850. 

Whites. Total. 

Population of the Free States 13,233.670 l^*?*'^?^ 

Population of the Slave States 6,184,477 9,612,9^6 

Balances in favor of the Free States, .... 7,049,193 3,821,946 



FREE COLOKED AND SLAVE — 1850. 

Free Negroes in the Slave States 228,1.38 

Free Negroes in the Free States 196,116 

Excess of Free Negroes in the Slave States 32,022 

Slaves in the Slave States 3,200,364 

Free Negroes in the Slave States 228,138 

Aggregate Negro Population of the Slave States in 1850 3,428,502 



THE TEREITORIES AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 

Area in Square Miles. Population. 

Indian Territory 71,127 

Kansas " 114,798 

Minnesota " 166,025 6,077 

Nebraska " 335,882 

N. Me-xico " 207,007 61,547 

Oregon " 185,030 13,294 

Utah " 269,170 11,380 

Washington " 123,022 

Columbia, Dist. of 60 *51,687 



Aggregate of Area and Population 1,472,121 143,985 



NUMBER OF SLAVEHOLDERS IN THE UNITED STATES — 1850. 

Alabama 29,295 

Arkansas 6,999 

Columbia, District of 1,477 

Delaware 809 

Florida 3,520 

Georgia 38,456 

Kentucky 38,385 

Louisiaua 20,670 



Carried forward, 138,611 

* Of 'he M.'^«7 InhnbU.ints in the District of Columbia, iu 1850, 10,057 were Free Colorsd, 
Hid i>,Ooi »ere vluves. 



now SLAVERY CAlf BE ABCLISHED. Y3 

Brought forward 138,611 

Maryland 16,040 

Mississippi 23,116 

Missouri 19,185 

North Carolina 28,303 

South Carolina 25,596 

Tennessee 33,864 

Texas 7,747 

Virginia 55,063 

Total Number of Slaveholders in the United States 347,525 



CLASSIFICATION OF SLAVEH0LDEE8 — 1850. 

Holders of 1 slave 08,820 

Holders of 1 and under 5 105,683 

Holders of 5 and under 10 80,705 

Holders of 10 and under 20 54,595 

Holders of 20 and under 50 29,733 

Holders of 50 aad under 100 6,196 

Holders of 100 and under 200 1,479 

Holders of 200 and under 300 187 

Holders of 300 and under 600 56 

Holders of 500 and under 1,000 9 

Holders of 1,000 and over 2 

Aggregate Number of Slaveholders in the United States .' 347,525 



It thus appears that there are in the United States, three hundred and 
forty-seven thousand five hundred and twenty-five slaveholders. But 
this appearance is deceptive. The actual number is certainly less than 
two hundred thousand. Professor De Bow, the Superintendent of the 
Census, informs us that "the number includes slave-hirers," and further- 
more, that " where the party owns slaves in different counties, or in dif- 
ferent States, he will be entered more than once." Now every South- 
erner, who has any practical knowledge of affairs, must kuow, and does 
know, that every New Year's day, like almost every other day, is dese- 
crated in the South, by publicly hiring out slaves to large numbers of 
non-slaveholders. The slave-owners, who are the exclusive manufac- 
turers of public sentiment, have popularized the dictum that white ser- 
vants are unfashionable ; and there are, we are sorry to say, nearly one 
hundred and sixty thousand non-slaveholding sycophants, who have sub- 
scribed to this false philosophy, and who are giving constant encourage- 
ment to the infamous practices of slaveholding and slave-breeding, by 
hiring at least one slave every year. 

With the statistics at our command, it is impossible for us to ascer- 
tain the exact numbers of slaveholders and non-slaveholding slave-hirers 
in the slave States ; but we have data which will enable us to approach 
very near to the facts. The town from which we hail, Salisbury, the 
capital of Rowan county, North Carolina, contains about twenty-three 
hundred inhabitants, including three hundred and seventy-two slaves, 

4 



74: HOW SLA\TiKY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

firty-one slaveholders, and forty-three non-slaveholding slave-hirers. 
Taking it fur granted that this town furnishes a fair relative proportion 
of all the slaveholding, and non-slaveholding slave-hirers in the slave 
States, the whole number of the former, including those who have been 
" entered more than once," is one hundred and eighty-eight thousand 
five hundred and fifty-one; of the latter, one hundred and fifty- eight 
thousand nine hundred and seventy-four; and, now, estimating that 
there are in Maryland, Virginia, and other grain-growing States, an 
aggregate of two thousand slave-owners, who have cotton plantations 
stocked with negroes in the far South, and who have been " entered 
more than once," we fmd, as the result of our calculations, that the 
total number of actual slaveholders in the Union, is precisely one hun- 
dred and eighty-six thousand five hundred and fifty-one — as follows : 

Number of actual slaveholders in the Uuited States 186,551 

Number " entered more than once " 2,000 

Number of non-slaveholding slave-hirers 158,974 

Aggregate number, according to De Bow 347,525 

The greater number of non-slaveholding slave-hirers, are a kind of 
third-rate aristocrats — persons who formely owned slaves, but whom 
slavery, as is its custom, has dragged down to poverty, leaving them, in 
their false and shiftless pride, to eke out a miserable existence over the 
hapless chattels personal of other men. 

Thus far in giving expression to our sincere and settled opinions, we 
have endeavored to show, in the first place, that slavery is a great moral, 
social, civil, and political evil — a dire enemy to true wealth and national 
greatness, and an atrocious crime against both God and man ; and, in 
the second jdace, that it is a paramount duty which we owe to heaven, 
to the earth, to America, to humanity, to our posterity, to our con- 
sciences, and to our pockets, to adopt eflectual and judicious measures 
for its immediate suppression. The questions now arise. How can the 
evil be averted ? "What are the most prudent and practicable means that 
can bo devised for the abolition of slavery ? In the solution of these 
jiroblems it becomes necessary to deal with a multiplicity of stubborn 
realities. And yet, we can see no reason why North Carolina, in her 
sovereign cajjacity, may not with equal ease and success, do what 
forty-five other States of the world have done within the last forty -five 
years. Nor do we believe any good reason exists why Virginia should 
not perform as great a deed in 1869 as did New York in 1799. Mas- 
Bachusetta abolished slavery in 1780 ; would it not be a masterly stroke 
of policy in Tennessee, and every other slave State, to abolish it in or 
before 1870? 

To the non-slaveholding whites of the South, as a deeply-wronged 



HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 76 

aud vituUy distinct political party, we must look for that change of law, 
or reorganization of society, which, at an early dav, we hope, is to result 
in the substitution of liberty for slavery ; and, under aU the circum- 
stances, it now becomes their duty to mark out an independent course for 
themselves, and to utterly contemn and ignore the many base instru- 
ments of power, animate and inanimate, which have been so freely and 
so effectually used for their enslavement. Steering entirely clear of the 
oligarchy, now is the time for the non-slaveholders to assert their rights 
and liberties; never before was there such an appropriate period to 
strike for Freedom in the South. 

Had it not been for the better sense, the purer patriotism, and the 
more practical justice of the non-slaveholders, the Middle States and 
ISTew England would still be groaning and grovelling under the ponderous 
burden of slavery; New York would never have risen above the dishon- 
orable level of Virginia ; Pennsylvania, trampled beneath the iron-heel 
of tlie black code, would have remained the unprogressive parallel of 
Georgia ; Massachusetts would have continued till the present time, and 
Heaven only knows how much longer, the contemptible coequal of South 
Carolina. 

Succeeded by the happiest moral effects and the grandest physical 
results, we have seen slavery crushed beneath the wisdom of the non- 
slaveholding statesmen of the North ; followed by corresponding influ- 
ences and acliievements, many of us vrho have not yet passed the meri- 
dian of life, are destined to see it equally crushed beneath the wisdom 
of the non-slaveholding statesmen of the South. With righteous ind'ig- 
nation, we enter our protest against' the base yet baseless admission that 
Louisiana and Texas are incapable of producing as great statesmen as 
Ehode Island and Connecticut. "What has been done for New Jersey by 
the statesmen of New Jersey, can be done for Kentucky by tlie states- 
men of Kentucky ; the wisdom of the former State has abolished slavery ; 
as sure as tlie earth revolves on its axis, the wisdom of the latter will 
not do less. 

That our plan for the abolition of slavery is the best that can bo 
devised, we have not the vanity to contend ; but that it is a good one, 
and will do to act upon until a better shall have been suggested, we do 
firmly and conscientiously believe. Though but little skilled in the deli- 
cate art of surgery, we have pretty thoroughly probed slavery, the 
frightful tumor on the body politic, and have, we think, ascertained the 
jirecise remedies requisite for a speedy and perfect cure. Possibly the 
less ardent friends of freedom may object to our prescription, on the 
ground that some of its ingredients are too griping, and that it will cost 
the patient a deal of most excruciating pain. But let them remember 
that the patient is exceedingly refractory, that the case is a desperate 
one, and that drastic remedies are indispensably necessary, "When they 



76 HOW SLAVEKY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

shall have discovered milder yet equally eflficacions ones, it will be time 
euoiiyb to di.scontiuue the use of ours — then no one will be readier than 
we to discard the infallible strong recipe for the infallible mild. Not at 
the persecution of a few thousand slaveholders, but at the restitution of 
natural rights and prerogatives to several million of non-slaveholders, 
do we aim. 

|- Inscribed on the banner, which we herewith unfurl to the world, with 
the full and fixed determination to stand by it or di® by it, unless one of 
more virtuous efficacy shall be presented, are the mottoes which, in sub- 
stance, embody the principles, as we conceive, that should govern us in our 
patriotic warfare against the most subtle and insidious foe that ever men- 
aced the inalienable rights and liberties and dearest interests of America : 
1st. Thorough Organization and Independent Political Action on the 

part of the Xon-Slaveholding Whites of the South. 
!lud. Ineligibility of Pro-.slavery Slaveholders — K^ever another vote to 
any one who advocates the Retention and Perpetuation of Human 
Slavery. 
3rd. No Cooperation with Pro-slavery Politicians — No Fellowship with 

them in Religion — No Affiliation with them in Society. 
4th. No Patronage to Pro-slavery Merchants — No Guestship in Slave- 
waiting Hotels — No Fees to Pro-slavery Lawyers — No Employment of 
Pro-slavery Physicians — No audience to Pro-slavery Parsons. 
5th. No more Hiring of Slaves by Non-Slaveholders. 
6th. Abrupt Discontinuance of Subscription to Pro-slavery Newspapers. 
7th. The Greatest Possible Encouragement to Free "White Labor. 

This, then, is the outline of our scheme for the abolition of slavery in 
the Southern States. Let it be acted upon with due promptitude, and, 
as certain as truth is mightier than error, fifteen years will not elapse 
before every foot of territory, from the mouth of the Delaware to tho 
eniboguing of the Rio Grande, will glitter with the jewels of freedom. 
Some time during this year, next, or the year following, let tliere be a 
general convention of non-slaveholders from every slave State in the 
Union, to deliberate on the momentous issues now pending. First, let 
tlicui adopt measures for holding in restraint the mischievous excesses 
of the oligarchy; secondly, in order to cast off the thralldom which the 
despotic slave-power has fastened upon them, and, as the first step neces- 
sary to be taken to regain the inalienable rights and liberties with which 
they were invested by nature, but of which they have been divested by 
the Vandalic dealers in human flesh, let them devise ways and means for 
the complete anniiiilution of slavery ; thirdly, let them put forth an 
equitable and comprehensive platform, fully defining tlieir position, and 
inviting tlie active sympathy and cooperation of tlie millions of down- 
trodden non-slaveholders throughout the Southern and Southwestern 
States. Let all these things bo done, not too hastily, but with calmness, 



HOW SLAVEKT CAN BE ABOLISHED, 77 

deliberation, prudence and circumspection ; if need be, let the delet^ates 
to the convention continue in session one or two weeks ; only let their 
labors be wisely and thoroughly performed ; let them, on Wednesday 
morning, present to the poor whites of the South, a well-digested scheme 
for the reclamation of their ancient rights and prerogatives, and, on the 
Thursday following, slavery in the United States will be worth abso- 
lutely less than nothing; for then, besides being so despicable and pre- 
carious that nobody will want it, it will be a lasting reproach to those 
in whose hands it is lodged. 

Were it not that other phases of the subject admonish us to be eco- 
nomical of space, we could suggest more than a dozen different plans, 
either of which, if scrupulously carried out, would lead to a wholesome, 
speedy, and perfect termination of slavery. Under all the circumstances, 
however, it might be difficult for us — perhaps it would not be the easiest 
thing in the world for anybody else — to" suggest a better plan than the 
one above. Let it, or one embodying its principal features, be adopted 
forthwith, and the last wail of slavery will soon be heard, growing 
fainter and fainter, till it dies iitterly away, to be succeeded by the jubi- 
lant shouts of emancipated millions. 

At the very moment we write, as has been the case ever since the 
United States have had a distinct national existence, and as will always 
continue to be the case, unless right triumphs over wrong, all the civil, 
political, and other offices, within the gift of the South, are filled with 
negro-nursed incumbents from the ranks of that artful band of misan- 
thropes — three hundred and forty-seven thousand in number — who, for 
the most part, obtain their living by breeding, buying and selling slaves. 
The magistrates in the villages, the constables in the districts, the com- 
missioners of the towns, the mayors of the cities, the sheriffs of the 
counties, the judges of the various courts, the members of the legis- 
latures, the governors of the States, the representatives and senators in 
Congress — are all slaveholders. Nor does the catalogue of their usurp- 
ations end here. By means of much barefaced arrogance and corrup- 
tion, they have obtained control of the General Government, and all the 
consuls, ambassadors, envoys extraordinary, and ministers plenipoten- 
tiaiy, who are chosen from the South, and commissioned to loreign 
countries, are selected with especial reference to the purity of their pro- 
slavery antecedents. If credentials have ever been issued to a single 
non-slaveholder of the South, we are ignorant of both the fact and the 
hearsay ; indeed, it would be very strange if this much abused class of 
persons were permitted to hold important offices abroad, when t^ej are 
not allowed to hold unimportant ones at home. 

And, then, there is the Presidency of the United States, which office 
has been held forty-eigJit years by slaveholders from the South, and only 
twenty years by non-slaveholders from the North. Nor is this the full re- 



78 HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

cord of oligarchical obtrusion. On an average, the offices of Secretary of 
State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of the 
Navy, Secretary of War, Postmaster-General and Attorney-General, have 
been under the control of slave-drivers nearly two-thirds of the time. The 
Chief Justices and the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the 
United States, the Presidents pro tem. of the Senate, and the Speakers of 
the House of Representatives, have, in a large majority of instances, been 
slave-breeders from the Southern side of the Potomac. Five slave- 
liolding Presidents have been reelected to the chief magistracy of the 
Republic, while no non-slaveholder has ever held the office more than a 
single term. Thus we see plainly that even the non-slaveholders of the 
North, to whose freedom, energy, enterprise, intelligence, wealth, popu- 
lation, power, progress, and prosperity, our country is almost exclusively 
indebted for its high position among the nations of the earth, have been 
arrogantly denied a due participation in the honors of federal office. 
When "the sum of all villainies " shall have ceased to exist, then the 
riglits of the non-slaveholders of the North, of the South, of the East, 
and of the West, will be duly recognized and respected ; not before. 

For the last sixty-eight years, slaveholders have been the sole and 
constant representatives of the South, and what have they accom- 
plished ? It requires but little time and few words, to tell the story of 
their indiscreet and unhallowed performances. In fact, with what we 
have already said, gestures alone would suffice to answer the inquiry. 
We can make neither a more truthful nor emphatic reply than to point 
to our thinly inhabited States, to our fields despoiled of their virgin 
soil, to the despicable price of lands, to our unvisited cities and towns, 
to our vacant harbors and idle water-power, to the dreary absence ot 
shipping and manufactories, to our unpensioned soldiers of the Revolu- 
tion, to the millions of living monuments of ignorance, to the squalid 
poverty of the whites, and to the utter wretchedness of the blacks. 

Either directly or indirectly, are pro-slavery politicians, who have 
ostentatiously set up pretensions to statesmanship, responsible for every 
dishonorable weakness and inequality that exists between the North and 
the South. Let them shirk the responsibility if they can ; but it is 
morally impossible for them to do so. We know how ready they have 
always been to cite the numerical strength of the North, as a valid 
excuse for their inability to procure appropriations from the General 
Government, for purposes of internal improvement, for the establish- 
ment of lines of ocean steamers to South American and European ports, 
and ^r tlie accomplishment of other objects. Before that apology ever 
escapes from their lips again, let them remember that the numeri- 
cal weakness of the South is wholly attributable to their own imbecile 
statisni. Had the Southern States, in accordance with the principles 
et mciatcd in the Declaration of Independence, abolished slavery at the 



HOW SLAVEEY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 79 

same time the Northern States abolished it, there would have been, 
long since, and most assuredly at this moment, a larger, wealthier, wiser, 
and more powerful population, south of Mason and Dixon's line, than 
there now is north of it. This fact being so well established that no 
reasonable man denies it, it is evident that the oligarchy will have to 
devise another subterfuge for even temporaiy relief. 

Until slavery and slaveholders cease to be the only favored objects of 
legislation in the South, the North will continue to maintain the ascen- 
dency in every important particular. With those mischievous objects 
out of the way, it would not require the non-slaveholders of the South 
more than a quarter of a century to bring her up, in all respects, to a 
glorious equality with the North ; nor would it take them much longer 
to surpass the latter, Avhich is the most vigorous and honorable rival 
that they have in the world. Three-quarters of a century hence, if 
slavery is abolished within the next ten years, as it ought to be, the 
South will, we believe, be as much greater than the North, as the North 
is now greater than the South. Three-quarters of a century hence, if 
the South retains slavery, which God forbid ! she will be to the North 
much the same that Poland is to Eussia, that Cuba is to Spain, or that 
Ireland is to England. 

Wliat we want and must have, as the only sure means of attaining to 
a position worthy of Sovereign States in this eminently progressive and 
utilitarian age, is an energetic, intelligent, enterprising, virtuous, and 
unshackled population ; an untrammelled press, and the Freedom of 
Speech. For ourselves, as white people, and for the negroes and other 
persons of whatever color or condition, we demand all the rights, inter- 
ests and prerogatives, that are guaranteed to corresponding classes of 
mankind in the North, in England, in France, in Germany, or in any 
other civilized and enlightened country. Any proposition that may be 
offered conceding less than this demand, will be promptly and disdain- 
fully rejected. 

Speaking of the non-slaveholders of the South, George M. Weston, a 
zealous co-laborer in the cause of Freedom, says : 

" The non-Blaveholdin<; whites of the South, beinR not less than seven-tenths of 
the whole number of whites, would seem to be entitled to some inquiry nito their 
actual condition ; and especially, as they have no real political weight or considera- 
tion in the country, and little opportunity to speak for themselves. I have been 
for twenty years a reader of Southern newspapers, and a reader and hearer of Con- 
gressional debates ; but, in all that time, I do not recollect ever to have seen or 
heard these uon-slaveholding whites referred to by Southern ' gentlemen,' as con- 
stituting any part of what they call ' ike South.' When the rights of the South, or 
its wrongs, or its policy, or its interests, or its institutions, are spoken of, reference 
is always intended to the rights, wrongs, policy, interests, and institutions of the 
three hundred and forty-seven thousand slaveholders. Nobody gets into Congress 
from the South but by their direction; nobody speaks at Washington for any 
Southern interest except theirs. Yet there is, at the South, quite another interest 
than theirs ; embracing from two to three times as many white people : and, as we 
shall presently see, entitled to the deepest sympathy and commiseration, in view 



80 now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

of the material, intellectual, and moral privations to •which it has been subjected, 
the degradation to which it has already been reduced, and the still more fearful 
degradation with which it is threatened by the ine\atable operation of existing 
causes and influences." 

The following extract, from a paper on "Domestic Manufactures in 
the South and West," published by M. Tarver, of Missouri, may be 
appropriately introduced in this connection : 

" The non-slaveholders possess, generally, but very small means, and the land 
which they possess is almost universally poor, and so sterile that a scanty subsis- 
tence is all that can be derived from its cultivation ; and the more fertile soil, being 
in the possession of the slaveholders, must ever remain out of the power of those 
who have none. This state of things is a great drawback, and bears heavily upon 
and depresses the moral energies of the poorer classes. The acquisition of a 
respectable position in the scale of wealth appears sc difficult, that they decline 
the hopeless pursuit, and many of them settle down into habits of idleness, and 
become the almost passive subjects of all its consequences. And I lament to say 
that 1 have observed, -of late years, that an evident deterioration is taking place in 
this part of the population, the younger portion of it being less educated, less 
industrious, and in every point of view less respectable than their ancestors." 

Equally worthy of attention is the testimony of Gov. Hammond, of 
South Carolina, who says : 

" According to the best calculation, which, in the absence of statistic facts, can 
be made, it is believed, that of the three hundred thousand white inhabitants of 
South Carolina, there are not less than fifty thousand whose industry, such as it is, 
and compensated as it is, is not, in the present condition of things, and does not 
promise to be hereafter, adequate to procure them, honestly, such a support as 
every white person is, and feels himself entitled to. And this, next to emigration, 
is, perhaps, the heaviest of the weights that press upon the springs of our pro- 
sperity. Most of those now follow agricultural pursuits, in feeble, yet injurious 
competition with slave labor. Some, perhaps, not more from inclination than 
from the want of due encouragement, can scarcely be said to work at all. They 
obtain a precarious subsistence, by occasional jobs, by hunting, by fishing, some- 
times by plundering fields or folds, and too often by what is, in its effects, far 
worse— trading with slaves, and seducing them to plunder for their benefit." 

Conjoined with the sundry ^jlain, straightforward facts which have 
issued from our own pen, these extracts show conclusively that immediate 
and independent political action on the part of the non-slaveholding 
whites of the South, is, Avith them, a matter, not only of positive duty, 
but also of the utmost importance. As yet, it is in their power to rescue 
the South from the gulf of shame and guilt, into which slavery has 
plunged her; but if they do not soon arouse themselves from their 
apathy, this power will be wrenched from them, and then, unable to 
resist the strong arm of the oppressor, they will be completely degraded 
to a social and political level with the negroes, whose condition of servi- 
tude will, in the meantime, become far more abject and forlorn than it 
is now. 

In addition to the reasons which wo have already assigned why no 
slavocrat should, in the future, be elected to any office whatever, there 
are others that deserve to be carefully considered. Among these, to 
speak plainly, may bo mentioned the ill-breeding and the ruffianism of 



now SLAVEKT CAN BE ABOLISHED. 81 

slaveholding officials. Tedious, indeed, would be the task to enumerate 
all the homicides, duels, assaults and batteries, and other crimes, of 
which they are the authors in the course of a single year. To the 
general reader their career at the seat of government is well known ; 
thei'e, on frequent occasions, choking with rage at seeing their wretched 
sophistries scattered to the winds by the sound, logical reasoning of the 
champions of Freedom, they have overstepped the bounds of common 
decency, vacated the chair of honorable controversy, and, in the most 
brutal and cowardly manner, assailed their unarmed opponents with 
bludgeons, bowie knives and pistols. Compared with some of their 
barbarisms at home, however, their frenzied onslaughts at the national 
Capital have been but the simplest breaches of civil deportment ; and it 
is only for the purpose of avoiding personalities that we now refrain 
from divulging a few instances of the unparalleled atrocities which they 
have perpetrated in legislative halls south of the Potomac. Nor is it 
alone in the national and State legislatures that they substitute brute 
force for genteel behavior and acuteness of intellect. Neither court- 
houses nor public streets, hotels nor private dwellings, rum-holes nor 
law-offices, are held sacred fi-om their murderous conflicts. About cer- 
tain silly abstractions that no practical business man ever allows to 
occupy his time or attention, they are eternally wrangling ; and thus it 
is that rencounters, duels, homicides, and other demonstrations of per- 
sonal violence, have become so popular in all slaveholding communities. 
A few years of entire freedom from the cares and perplexities of public 
life would, we have no doubt, greatly improve both their manners and 
their morals ; and we suggest that it is a Christian duty, which devolves 
on the non-slaveholders of the South, to disrobe them of the mantle of 
office, which they have so long worn with disgrace to themselves, injus- 
tice to their constituents, and ruin to their country. 

But what shall we say of such men as Botts, Stuart, and Macfarland 
of Virginia ; of Kaynor, Morehead, Stanley, Graves, and Graham of 
IsTortli Carolina; of Davis and Hoffman of Maryland; of Blair and 
Brown of Missouri ; of the Marshalls of Kentucky ; and of Etheridge of 
Tennessee ? All these gentlemen, and many others of the same school, 
entertain, we believe, sentiments similar to those that were entertained 
by the immortal Fathers of the Republic — that slavery is a great moral, 
social, civil, and political evil, to be got rid of at the earliest practicable 
period — and if they do, in order to secure our votes, it is only necessary 
for them to "have the courage of their opinions," to renounce slavery, 
and to come out frankly, fairly and squarely in favor of freedom. To 
neither of these patriotic sons of the South, nor to any one of the class 
to which they belong, "vvould we give any offence whatever. In our 
strictures on the criminality of pro-slavery demagogues we have had 
heretofore, and shall have hereafter, no sort of reference to any respect- 

4* 



82 HOW SLAVEKY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

able slaveholder — by wbicli we mean, any slaveholder who admits the 
injustice and inhumanity of slavery, and who is not averse to the discus- 
sion of measures for its speedy and total extinction. Such slaveholders 
are virtually on our side — that is, on the side of the non-slaveholding 
whites, with whom they may very properly be classified. On this point, 
once for all, we desire to be distinctly understood ; for it would be mani- 
festly unjust not to discriminate between the anti-slavery proprietor who 
owns slaves by the law of entailment, and the pro-slavery proprietor who 
engages in the traffic and becomes an aider an abettor of the system from 
sheer turpitude of heart ; hence the propriety of this special disclaimer. 

If we have a correct understanding of the positions which they 
assumed, some of the gentlemen whose names are written above, gave, 
during the last presidential campaign, ample evidence of their unswerv- 
ing devotion to the interests of the great majority of the people, the 
non-slaveholding whites ; and it is our unbiased opinion that a more 
positive truth is nowhere recorded in Holy Writ, than Kenneth Raynor 
uttered, when he said, in substance, that the greatest good that could 
happen to this country would be the complete overthrow of Black Demo- 
cracy, alias the pro-slavery party, which has for its head and front the 
Ritchies and Wises of Virgiuia, and for its caudal termination the Keitts 
and Quattlebums of South Carolina. 

Peculiarly illustrative of the material of which sham democracy is 
composed was the vote polled at the Five Points precinct, in the city 
of New York, on the 4th of November, 1856, when James Buchanan 
was chosen President by a minority of the people. "We will produce 
the figures : 

Five Points Precinct, New York City, 1856. 

Votes cast for James Buchanan 674 

" " John C. Fremont 16 

" " Millard Fillmore 9 

It will be recollected that Col. Fremont's majority over Buchanan, in 
the State of New York, was between seventy-eight and seventy-nine 
thousand, and that he ran ahead of the Fillmore ticket to the number of 
nearly one hundred and fifty one thousand. We have not the shadow 
of a doubt that he is perfectly satisfied with Mr. Buchanan's triumph at 
the Five Points, which, with the exception of the slave-pens in Southern 
cities, is, perhaps, the most vile and heart-sickening locality in the 
United States. 

One of the most noticeable and commendable features of the last 
general election is this : almost every State, whose inhabitants have 
enjoyed the advantages of free soil, free labor, free speech, free presses, 
and free schools, and who have, in consequence, become great in num- 
bers, in virtue, in wealth, and in wisdom, voted for Fremont, the Repub- 
lican candidate, who was pledged to use his influence for the extension 



now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 83 

of like advantages to other parts of the country. On the other hand, 
with a single honorable exception, all the States which " have got to 
hating everything with the prefix Free, from free negroes down and up 
through the whole catalogue — free farms, free labor, free society, free 
will, free thinking, free children, and free schools," and which have 
exposed their citizens to all the perils of numerical weakness, absolute 
ignorance, and hopeless poverty, voted for Buchanan, the Democratic 
candidate, who, in reply to the overtures of his pro-slavery partisans, 
had signified his willingness to pursue a policy that would perpetuate 
and disseminate, without limit, the multitudinous evils of human bondage. 
That less than three j>qv cent, of those who voted for Col. Fremont, 
that only about five per cent, of those who gave their suffrages to Mr. 
Fillmore, and that more than eighteen per cent, of those who supported 
Mr. Buchanan, were persons over one-and-twenty years of age who could 
not read and write, are estimates which we have no doubt are not far 
from the truth, and which, in the absence of reliable statistics, we ven- 
ture to give, hoping, by their publicity, to draw closer attention to the 
fact, that tlie illiterate foreigners of the ISTorth, and the unlettered natives 
of the South, were cordially united in their suicidal adherence to the 
pro-slavery party. With few exceptions, all the intelligent non-slave- 
liolders of the South, in concert with the more respectable slaveholders, 
voted for Mr. Fillmore ; certain rigidly patriotic persons of the former 
class, whose hearts were so entirely with the gallant Fremont that they 
refused to vote at all— simply because they did not dare to express their 
preference for him — form the exceptions to which we allude. 

Though the Whig, Democratic, and Know-iSTothing newspapers, in all 
the States, free and slave, denounced Col. Fremont as an intolerant 
Catholic, it is now generally conceded that he was nowhere supported 
by the peculiar friends of Pope Pius IX. The votes polled at the Five 
Points precinct, which is almost exclusively inhabited by low Irish 
Catholics, show how powerfully the Jesuitical influence was brought to 
bear against him. At that delectable locality, as we have already shown, 
tlie timid Sage of Wheatland received five hundred and seventy-four votes 
—whereas the dauntless Finder of Empire received only sixteen. 

True to their instincts for Freedom, the Germans, generally, voted the 
right ticket, and they will do it again, and continue to do it. With the 
intelligent Protestant element of the Fatherland on our side, we can well 
afford to dispense with the ignorant Catholic element of the Emerald 
Isle. In the influences which they exert on society, there is so little 
difierence between Slavery, Popery, and :Nregro-driving Democracy, that 
we are not at all surprised to see them going hand in hand in their dia- 
bolical work of inhumanity and desolation. 

There is, indeed, no lack of evidence to show that the Democratic 
party of +o-day is simply and unreservedly a sectional slavery party. On 



84 HOW SLWERT CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

the 15th of December, 1856, but a few weeks subsequent to the appear- 
ance of a scandalous message from an infamous governor of South Caro- 
lina, recommending the reopening of the African slave trade, Emerson 
Etheridge of Tennessee — honor to his name! — submitted, in the House of 
Representatives, the following timely resolution : 

' Eesolved — That this House regard all suggestions or propositions of every 
kind, by whomsoever made, for a revival of the slave trade, as shocking to the 
moral sentiments of the enlightened portion of mankind, and that any act on the 
part of Congress, legislating for, conniving at, or legalizing that horrid and inhu- 
man traffic, would justly subject the United States to the reproach and execration 
of all civilized and Christian people throughout the world." 

Who voted for this resolution ? and who voted against it ? Let the 
yeas and nays answer; they are on record, and he who takes the trou- 
ble to examine them will find that the resolution encountered no oppo- 
sition worth mentioning, except from members of the Democratic party. 
Sci'utinize the yeas and nays on any other motion or resolution aifecting 
the question of slavery, and the fact that a majority of the members of 
this party have uniformly voted for the retention and extension of the 
"sum of all villainies," will at once be apparent. 

For many years the slave-driving Democrats of the South have labored 
most strenuously, both by day and by night — we regret to say how un- 
successfully — to point out abolition proclivities in the Whig and Know- 
Nothing parties, the latter of which is now buried, and deservedly, so 
deep in the depths of the dead, that it is quite preposterous to suppose it 
wdl ever see the light of resurrection. 

For its truckling concessions to the slave power, the Whig party 
merited defeat, and defeated it was, and that, too, in the most decisive 
and overwhelming manner. But there is yet in this party much vitality, 
and if its friends will reorganize, detach themselves from the burden of 
elavery, and hoist the fair flag of freedom, the time may come, at a day 
by no means remote, when their hearts will exult in triumph over the 
ruins of miscalled Democracy. 

It is not too late, however, for the Democratic party to secure to itself 
allure renown and an almost certain perpetuation of its power. Let it 
at once discard the worship of slavery, and do earnest battle for the 
principles of freedom, and it will live victoriously to a period far in the 
future. On the other hand, if it does not soon repudiate the fatal here- 
sies which it has incorporated into its creed, its doom will bo inevitable. 
Until the black flag entirely disappears from its array, we warn the non- 
slaveholders of the South to repulse and keep it at a distance, as they 
would the emblazoned skull and cross-bones that flout them from the flag 
of the pirate. 

With regard to the sophistical reasoning which teaches that abolitiouT 
ists, before abolishing slavery, should compensate the slaveholders foj aU 



now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISUED. 85 

or any number of the negroes in their possession, we shall endeavor not 
to be wearisome ; but wishing to brace our arguments, in every impor- 
tant particular, with unequivocal testimony from men whom we are ac- 
customed to regard as models of political sagacity and integrity — from 
Southern men as far as possible — we herewith present an extract from 
a speech delivered in the Virginia House of Delegates, January 20, 1832, 
by Charles James Faulkner, whose sentiments, as then and there 
expressed, can hardly fail to find a response in the heart of every intelli- 
gent, upright man : 

" But, sir. it is said that society having conferred this property on the slaveholder, 
it cannot now take it from him without an adequate compensation, by which is 
meant full value. I may be singular in the opinioh, but I defy the legal research of 
the House to point me to a principle recognized by the law. even in the ordinary 
course of its adjudications, wh-jre the community pays f.ir property which is 
removed or destroyed because it is a nuisance, and found injurious to that society. 
There is, I humbly apprehend, no such principle. There is no obligation upon 
society to continue your right one moment after it becomes injurious to the best 
interests of society; nor to compensate you for the loss of that, the deprivation of 
which is demanded by the safety of the State, and in which general benefit you par- 
ticipate as a member of the community. Sir, there is to my mind a manifest dis- 
tinction between condemning private property to be applied to some beneficial 
public purpose, and condemning or removing private property which is ascertained 
to be a positive wrong to society. It is a distinction which pervades the whole 
genius of the law ; and is founded upon the idea, that any man who holds property 
injurious to the peace of that society of which he is a member, thereby violates the 
condition upon the observance of which his right to the property is alone guaran- 
teed. For property of the first class condemned there ought to be compensation; 
but for the property of the latter class, none can be demanded upon principle, none 
accorded as a matter of right. 

'• It is conceded that, at this precise moment of our legislation, slaves are inju- 
rious to the interests and threaten the subversion and ruin of this Commonwealth. 
Their present number, their increasing number, all admonish us of this. In difler- 
ent terms, and in more measured language, the same fact has been conceded by aU 
who have yet addressed this House. ^Something must be done,' emphatically ex- 
claimed the gentleman from Dinwiddle : and I thought I could perceive a response 
to that declaration, in the countenance of a large majority of this body. And why 
must something be done? Becan.se if not, says the gentleman from Campbell, the 
throats of all the white people of Virginia will be cut. No, says the gentleman from 
Dinwiddle— 'The whites cannot be conquered— the throats of the 6/acA-s will be 
cut.' It is a trifling difference, to be sure, sir. and matters not to the argument. 
For the fact is conceded, that one race or the other must be exterminated. 

•'Sir, such being the actual condition of this Comraonwealfh. I ask if we would 
not be justified now, supposing all considerations of policy and humanity concurred, 
without even a moment's delay, in staving oft' this appalling and overwhelmmg 
calamitv? Sir. if this immense negro population were now m arms, gathering 
into black and formidable masses of attack, would that man be listened to, who 
spoke about property, who prayed you not to direct your artillery to such or such 
a point, for yon would destroy some of his property ? Sir, to the eye of the States- 
man, as to the eye of Omniscience, dangers pressing, and dangers that must ticcm- 
sa/'i/!/ press, are alike present. With a single glance he embraces Virginia now, 
with the elements of destruction reposing quietly upon her bosom, and Virginia is 
li'i-hted from one extremity to the other with the torch of servile insurrection and 
massacre. It is not sufficient for him that the match is not yet applied. It is enough 
that the magazine is open, and the match will shortly be applied. 

'• Sir, it is true in national as it is in private contracts, that loss and in)ury 
to one party may constitute as fair a consideration as gain to the other. Docs 
the slaveholder, while he is enjoving his slaves, reflect upon the deep injury 
and incalculable loss which the possession of that property inflicts upon the true 
interests of the country? Slavery, it is admitted, is an evil— it is an institution 
which presses heavily against the best interests of the State. It banishes free 
white labor, it exterminates the mechanic, the artisan, the manufacturer. It de- 
prives them of occupation. It deprives them of bread. It converts the encrgv of 



86 HOW SLAVERY CAJ^ BE ABOLISHED. 

a community iuto indolence, its power into imbecility, its eflSciency into weakness. 
Sir, being thus injurious, have we not a right to demand its extermination? shall 
society suffer, that the slaveholder may continue to gather his crop of human flesh? 
What is his rae?e pecuniary claim compared with the great interests of the common 
weal? Must the country languish, droop, die, that the slaveholder may flourish? 
Shall all the interests be subservient to one — all rights subordinate to those of the 
slaveholder? Has not the mechanic, have not the middle classes their rights — 
rights incompatible with the existence of slavery? 

"Sir, so great and overshadowing are the evils of slavery — so sensibly are they 
felt by those who have traced the causes of our national decline — so perceptible is 
the poisonous operation of its principles in the varied and diversified interests in 
this Commonwealth, that all, whose minds are not warped by prejudice or interest, 
must admit that the disease has now assumed that mortal tendency, as to justify 
the application of any remedy which, under the great law of State necessity, we 
might consider advisable." 

At once let the good and true men of tliis country, the patriot sons 
of the patriot fathers, determine that the sun which rises to celebrate 
the centennial anniversary of our national independence, shall not set on 
the head of any slave within the limits of this Republic. Will not the 
non-slaveholders of the North, of the South, of the East, and of the 
West, heartily, unanimously sanction this proposition? Will it not be 
cheerfully indorsed by many of the slaveholders themselves ? Will any 
respectable man enter a protest against it? On the 4th of July, 1876 — • 
sooner, if we can — let us make good, at least so far as we are concerned, 
the Declaration of Independence, which was proclaimed in Philadelphia 
on the 4:th of July, 1776 — that "all men are endowed by their Creator 
with certain inalienable rights ; that among these, are life, liberty, and 
the pursuit of happiness ; that to secure these rights, governments are 
instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of 
the governed ; that whenever any form of government becomes destruc- 
tive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, 
and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such prin- 
ciples, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem 
most likely to effect their safety and happiness." In purging our land 
of the iniquity of negro slavery, we shall only be carrying on the great 
work that was so successfully commenced by our noble sires of the 
Ivcvolution ; some future generation may possibly complete the work by 
annuUhig the last and least form of oppression. 

To turn the slaves away from their present homes — away from all the 
property and means of support which their labor has mainly produced, 
would be unpardonably cruel— exceedingly unjust. Still more cruel and 
unjust would it be, however, to the non-slaveholding whites no less than 
to the negroes, to grant further toleration to the existence of slavery. 
In any event, come what will, transpire what may, the system must bo 
abolished. The evils, if any, which are to result from abolition, cannot, 
by any manner of means, be half as great as the evils which are certain 
to overtake us in case of its continuance. The perpetuation of slavery 
is the climax of iniquity. 



now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 87 

Two hundred and thirty-nine years have the negroes in America been 
held in inhua.an bondage. Duruag the whole of this long period they 
have toiled unceasingly, from the grey of dawn till the dusk of eve, for 
their cruel task-masters, who have rewarded them with scanty allow- 
ances of the most inferior qualities of victuals and clothes, Avith heart- 
less separations of the tenderest ties of kindred, with epithets, with 
scoldings, with execrations, and with the lash — and, not unfrequently, 
witli the fatal bludgeon or the more deadly weapon. From the labor of 
their hands, and from the fruit of their loins, the human-mongers of the 
South have become wealthy, insolent, corrupt and tyrannical. In reason 
and in conscience, it must be admitted, the slaves might claim for tliem- 
selves a liberal allowance of the proceeds of their labor. If they were 
to demand an equal share of all the property, real and personal, which 
has been accumulated or produced through their efforts. Heaven, we 
believe, would recognize them as honest claimants. 

Elsewhere we have shown, by just and liberal estimates, that, on the 
single score of damages to lands, the slaveholders are, at this moment, 
indebted -to the noU'Slaveholding whites in the extraordinary sum of 
$7,544,148,825. Considered in connection with the righteous claim of 
wages for services which the negroes might bring against their masters, 
these figures are the heralds of the significant fact that, if strict justice 
could be meted out to all parties in the South, the slaveholders would 
not only be stripped of every dollar, but they would become in law as 
tliey are in reality, the hopeless debtors of the myriads of unfortunate 
slaves, white and black, who are now cringing, and fawning, and fester- 
ing around them. 

For the services of the blacks from the 20th of August, 1620, up to 
the 4th of July, 1869 — an interval of precisely two hundred and forty- 
eight years ten months and fourteen days — their masters, if unwilling, 
ought, in our judgment, to be compelled to grant them their freedom, 
and to pay each and every one of them at least sixty dollars cash in 
hand. The aggregate sum thus raised would amount to about two hun- 
dred and fifty million of dollars, which is less than the total market value 
of two entire crops of cotton — one-half of which sum would be amply 
sufficient to land every negro in this country on the coast of Liberia, 
whither, if we had the power, we would ship them all within tlie next 
six months. As a means of protection against the exigencies which 
might arise from a sudden transition from their present homes in Ame- 
rica to their future homes in Africa, and for the purpose of enabling 
them there to take the iniatory step in the walks of civilized life, the 
remainder of the sum— say about one liundred and twenty-five million 
of dollars— might, very properly, be equally distributed amongst tliem 
after their arrival in the land of their fathers. 

Dr. James Hall, the Secretary of the Maryland Colonization Society, 



Emigrants 

to 
Liberia. 



88 now SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

informs us that the average cost of sending negroes to Liberia does not 
exceed thirty dollars each ; and it is his opinion that arrangements might 
be made on an extensive plan for conveying them thither at an average 
expense of not more than twenty-five dollars each. 

The American colonization movement, as now systematized and con- 
ducted, is, in our opinion, simply an American humane farce. At pre- 
sent the slaves are increasing in this country at the rate of nearly one 
hundred thousand per annum; within the last twelve years, as will 
appear below, the American Colonization Society has sent to Liberia 
less than five thousand negroes. 

Emigrants sent to Liberia by the American Colonization Society, 
during the twelve years ending January 1st, 1859. 

In 1847 39 ] 

In 1848 213 

In 1849 474 

In 1850 590 

In 1851 279 

In 1852 568 

In 1853 583 

In 1854 783 

In 1855 207 

In 1856 544 

In 1857 370 

In 1858 163 

Total 4,813 

liie average of this total is a fraction over four hundred and one, 
which may be said to be the number of negroes annually colonized by 
the society ; while the yearly increase of slaves, as previously stated, is 
little less than one hundred thousand? Fiddlesticks for such coloniza- 
tion ! Once for all, within a reasonably short period, let us, by an 
equitable system of legislation, and by such other measures as may be 
right and proper, compel the slaveholders to do something like justice to 
their negroes by giving each and every one of them his freedom, and 
sixty dollars in current money ; then let us charter all the ocean steam- 
ers, packets and clipper ships that can be had on liberal termp, and keep 
them constantly plying between the ports of America and Africa, until 
all the slaves who' are here held in bondage shall enjoy freedom in the 
laud of their fathers. Under a well-devised and properly conducted 
system of operations, but a few years would be required to redeem the 
Unitoil States fi-om the monstrous curse of negro slavery. 

Some few years ago, when certain ethnographical oligarchs proved to 
their own satisfaction that the negro was an inferior "type of mankind," 
they chuckled wonderfully, and avowed, in substance, that it was right 
for the stronger race to kidnap and enslave the weaker — that because 
Nature had been pleased to do a trifle more for the Caucasian race than 
for the African, the former, by virtue of its superiority, was perfectly 



HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 89 

justifiable in holding the latter in absolute and perpetual bondage ! No 
system of logic could be more antagonistic to the spirit of true democracy. 
It is probable that the world does not contain two persons who are 
exactly alike in all respects ; yet '■'■all men are endowed by their Creator 
with certain inalieiiahle rights, among which are life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness." All mankind may or may not be the descend- 
ants of Adam and Eve. In our own humble way of thinking, we are 
frank to confess, we do not believe in the unity of the races. This is a 
matter, however, which has little or nothing to do with the great ques- 
tion at issue. Aside from any theory concerning the original parentage 
of the different races of men, facts, material and immaterial, palpable 
and impalpable — facts of the eyes and facts of the conscience — crowd 
around us on every hand, heaping proof upon proof, that slavery is a 
shame, a crime, and a curse — a great moral, social, civil, and political 
evil — an oppressive burden to the blacks, and an incalculable injury to 
the whites — a stumbling-block to the nation, an impediment to progress, 
a damper on all the nobler instincts, principles, aspirations and enter- 
prises of man, and a dire enemy to every true interest. 

Waiving all other counts, we have, we think, shown, to the satisfac- 
tion of every impartial reader, that, as elsewhere stated, on the single 
score of damages to lands, the slaveholders are, at this moment, 
indebted to us, the non-slaveholding whites, in the enormous sum of 
nearly seventy-six hundred million of dollars. "What shall be done with 
this amount? It is just; shall payment be demanded? No; all the 
slaveholders in the country could not pay it ; nor shall we ever ask them 
for even a moiety of the amount — no, not even for a dime, nor yet for a 
cent ; we are willing to forfeit every farthing for the sake of freedom ; 
for ourselves we ask no indemnification for the past : we only demand 
justice for the future. 

But sirs, slaveholders, chevaliers and lords of the lash, we are 
unwilling to allow you to cheat the negroes out of all the rights and 
claims to which, as human beings, they are most sacredly entitled. Not 
alone for ourself as an individual, but for others also— particularly for 
five or six million of Southern non-slaveholding whites, whom your 
iniquitous statism has debarred from almost aU the mental and material 
comforts of life — do we speak, when we say, you must, sooner or later, 
emancipate your slaves, and pay each and every one of thein at least 
sixty dollars cash in hand. By doing this, you will be restoring to them 
their natural rights, and remunerating them at the rate of less than 
twenty-six cents per annum for the long and cheerless period of their 
servitude, from the 20th of August, 1620, when, on James River, in 
Virginia, they became the unhappy slaves of heartless tyrants. More- 
over, by doing this you will be performing but a simple act of justice 
to the non-slaveholding whites, upon whom the system of slavery has 



90 HOW SLAVERY CAN BE ABOLISHED. 

weighed scarcely less heavily than upon the negroes themselves. You 
will also be applying a saving balm to your own outraged hearts and 
consciences, and your children — yourselves in fact — freed from the 
accursed stain of slavery, will become respectable, useful, and honora- 
ble members of society. 

And now, sirs, we have thus laid down our ultimatum. What are you 
going to do about it? Something dreadful, of course! Perhaps you 
wiU dissolve the Union again. Do it, if you dare 1 Our motto, and we 
would have you to understand it, is The Abolition of Slavery^ and the 
Perpetuation of the Jjnerican Union. If, by any means, you do suc- 
ceed in your treasonable attempts, to take the South out of the Union 
to-day, we will bring her back to-morrow — if she goes away with you, 
she will return without you. 

Do not mistake the meaning of the last clause of the last sentence ; 
we could elucidate it so thoroughly that no intelligent person could fail 
to comprehend it ; but, for reasons which may hereafter appear, we 
forego the task. 

Henceforth there are other interests to be consulted in -the South, 
aside from the interests of negroes and slaveholders. A profound sense 
of duty incites us to make the greatest possible efforts for the abolition 
of slavery ; an equally profound sense of duty calls for a continuation of 
those efforts until the very last foe to freedom shall have been utterly 
vanquished. To the summons of the righteous monitor within, we shall 
endeavor to prove faithful ; no opportunity for inflicting a mortal wound 
in the side of slavery shall be permitted to pass us unimproved. 

Thus, terror-engeuderers of the South, have we fully and frankly defined 
our position ; we have no modifications to propose, no compromises to 
offer, nothing to retract. Frown, sirs, fret, foam, prepare your weapons, 
threat, strike, shoot, stab, bring on civil war, dissolve the Union, nay 
annihilate the solar system if you will — do all this, more, less, better, 
worse, anything — do what you wiU, sirs, you can neither foil nor intimi- 
date us ; our purpose is as firmly fixed as the eternal pillars of Heaven ; 
wo have determined to abolisli slavery, and, so help us God, abolish it 
we will ! Take this to bed with you to-night, sirs, and think about it, 
dream over it, ani let us know how you feel to-morrow morning. 



CHAPTEPw m. 

SOUTHEEX TESTIMONT AGAINST SLAVERY. 

"Slavery is detested — we feel its fatal effects — we deplore it with all the earnestness of 
humanity." — Patrick Henry. 

If it please the reader, let him forget all that we have written on the 
siihject of slavery ; if it accord with his inclination, let him ignore all 
that we may write hereafter. "We seek not to give special currency to 
our own peculiar opinions ; our greatest amhition, in these pages, is to 
popularize the sayings and admonitions of wiser and better men. Mira- 
cles, we believe, are no longer wrought in this bedeviled world ; but if, 
by any conceivable or possible supernatural event, the great Founders 
of the Republic, Washington, Jefierson, Henry, and others, could be 
reinvested with corporeal life, and returned to the South, there is scarcely 
a slaveholder between the Potomac and the mouth of the Mississippi, 
that would not burn to pounce upon them with bludgeons, bowie-knives 
and pistols ! Yes, without adding another word, Washu)gton would be 
mobled for what he has already said. Were Jefterson now employed as 
a professor in a Southern college, he would be dismissed and driven from 
the State, perhaps murdered before he reached the border. If Patrick 
Henry were a bookseller in Alabama, though it might be demonstrated 
beyond the shadow of a doubt that he had never bought, sold, received, 
or presented, any kind of literature except Bibles and Testaments, he 
would first be subjected to the ignominy of a coat of tar and feathers, and 
then limited to the option of unceremonious expatriation or death. 
How seemingly impossible are these statements, and yet how true! 
Where do we stand ? What is our faith ? Are we a flock without a 
shepherd ? a people without a prophet ? a nation without a government ? 

Has the past, with all its glittering monuments of genius and patriot- 
ism, furnished no beacon by which we may direct our footsteps in the 
fnture ? If we but prove true to ourselves, and worthy of our ancestry, 
we have notliing to fear; our Revolutionary sires have devised and 
bequeathed to us an almost perfect national policy. Let us cherish, and 
defend, and build upon, the fimdamental principles of that polity, and 
we shall most assuredly reap the golden fruits of unparalleled power, vir- 
tue and prosperity. Heaven forbid that a desperate faction of pro-sla- 
vory mountebanks should succeed in their infamous efforts to quench the 

91 



92 SOUTHEKN TESTBIONY AGAESTST SLAVERY. 

spirit of liberty, which our forefathers infused into those two sacred 
charts of our political faith, the Declaration of Independence, and the 
Constitution of the United States. Oligarchal politicians are a\one res- 
ponsible for the continuance of African slavery in the South. For pur- 
poses of self-aggrandizement, they have kept learning and civilization 
from the people ; they have willfully misinterpreted the national com- 
pacts and have outraged their own consciences by declaring to their illite- 
rate constituents, that the Founders of the Republic were not abolitionists. 
"When the dark clouds of slavery, error and ignorance shall have passed 
away, — and we believe the time is near at hand when they are to be 
dissipated,— the freemen of the South, like those of other sections, will 
learn the glorious truth, that inflexible opposition to Human Bondage 
has formed one of the distinguishing characteristics of every really 
good or great man that our country has produced. 

Non-slaveholders of the South ! up to the present period, neither as a 
body, nor as individuals, have you ever had an independent existence ; 
but, if true to yourselves and to the memory of your fathers, you, in 
equal copartnership with the non-slaveholders of the North, will soon 
become the honored rulers and proprietors of the most powerful, pros- 
perous, virtuous, free, and peaceful nation, on which the sun has ever 
shone. Already has the time arrived for you to decide upon what basis 
you will erect your political superstructure. Upon whom will you 
depend for an equitable and judicious form of constitutional govern- 
ment? Whom will you designate as models for your future statesmen? 
Your choice lies between the dead and the living — between the Wash- 
ingtonp, the Jeffersons and the Madisons of the past, and the Quattle- 
bums, the Iversous and tlie Slidells of the present. We have chosen ; 
choose ye, remembering that freedom or slavery is to be the issue of 
your option. 

As the result of much reading and research, and at the expenditure 
of no inconsiderable amount of time, labor and money, we now proceed 
to make known the anti-slavery sentiments of those noble abolitionists, 
the Fathers of the Republic, whose liberal measures of public poli.;- 
have been so criminally perverted by tlie treacherous advocates ui' 
slavery. 

Let us listen, in the first place, to the voice of him who was "first in 
war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen," to 

THE VOICE OF WASHINGTON. 

In a letter to John F. Mercer, dated September 9th, 1780, General 
Washington says : 

" I never mean, unless some particular circumstances should compel me to it, to 
possess another slave by purchase, it being among my first wishes to see some plan 
adopted by which slavery, in this country, may be abolished by law." 



SOUTirERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 93 

In a letter to Eobert Morris, dated April 12, 1786, he says : 

"I hope it will not be conceived from these observations that it is my wish to 
hold the unhappy people who are the subject of this letter in Slavery. 1 can only 
say, that there is not a man living, who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a 
plan adopted for the abolition of it ; but there is only one proper and effectual 
mode by which it can be accomplished, and that is by legislative authority; and 
this, as far as my suffrage will go, shall never be wanting." 

He says, in a letter 

•' To the JiARQUis DE Lafatette : April 5th, 1783. 

"The scheme, my dear Marquis, which you propose as a precedent, to 
encourage the emancipation of the black people in this country from the state of 
bondage" in which they are held, is a striking evidence of the benevolence of your 
heart. I shall be happy to join you in so laudable a work; but will defer going 
into a detail of the business till 1 have the pleasure of seeing you." 

In another letter to Lafayette, he says : 

" The benevolence of your heart, my dear Marquis, is so conspicuous on all occa- 
sions, that 1 never wonder at any fresh proofs of it ; but your late purchase of an 
estate in the Colony of Cayenne, with the view of emancipating the slaves on it, is 
a generous and noble proof of your humanity. Would to God a like spirit might 
diffuse itself generally into the minds of the people of this country." 

In a letter to Sir John Sinclair, he further said : 

" There are in Pennsylvania laws for the gradual abolition of slavery, which 
neither Virginia nor Maryland have at present, but which nothing is more certain 
than they must have, and at a period not remote." 

In a letter to Charles Pinckney, Governor of South Carolina, on the 
iVth of March, 1792, he says: 

"I must say that I lament the decision of your Legislature upon the question 
of importing slaves after March, 1793. I was in hopes that motives of policy, as 
well as other good reasons, supported by the direful efl'ects of Slavery, which at 
this moment are presented, would have operated to produce a total prohibition of 
the importation of slaves, whenever the question came to be agitated in any State 
that might be interested in the measure." 

From his last will and testament we make the following extract : 

" Upon the decease of my wife, it is my will and desire that all the slaves which 
1 hold in my own right shall receive their freedom. To emancipate them during her 
life would, though earnestly wished by me, be attended with such insuperable difli- 
culties, on account of their intermixture by marriage with the dower negroes, as 
to excite the most painful sensation, if not disagreeable consequences, Irom the 
latter, while both descriptions are in the occupancy of the same proprietor, it not 
being in my power, under the tenure by which the dower negroes are held, to 
manumit them." 

It is said that, " when Mrs. Washington learned, from the will of her 
deceased husband, that the only obstacle to the immediate perfection of 
this provision was her right of dower, she at once gave it up, and tho 
slaves were made free." A man might possibly concentrate within him- 
self more real virtue and influence than ever Washington possessed, and 
yet he would not be too good for such a wife. 



9i SOUTHERN TESTESIONY AGAINST SLAVEKT. 

From the Father of his Couptry, we no^- turn to the author of the 
Declaration of Independence. "We •will listen to 

TUE VOICE OF JEFFEKSON'. 

On the 39th and 40th pages of his " Notes on Virginal," Jefferson 

says : 

" There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of our people, 
proiluced by the existence of slavery among us. The whole commerce between 
ma-ter and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions — the most 
uuremittiuf? despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other. 
Our children see this, and learn to imitate it; for man is an imitative animal. This 
quality- is the germ of all education in him. From his cradle to his grave, he is 
learning to do what he sees others do. If a parent could find no motive, either in 
his philanthropy or his self-love, for restraining the intemperance of passion to- 
wards his slave, it should always be a sufficient one that his child is present. But 
generally it is not sufficient. The parent storms, the child looks on, catches the 
lineaments of wrath, puts on the same airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives a 
loose rein to the worst of passions , and, thus nursed, educated, and daily exercised 
in tyranny, cannot but be stamped by it with odious peculiarities. The man must 
be a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals undepraved by such circum- 
stances. And with what execration should the statesman be loaded, who, permit- 
ting one half the citizens thus to trample on the rights of the other, transforms 
those into' despots and these into enemies, destroj's the morals of the one part, and 
the amor patrice of the other ; for if a slave can have a country in this world, it 
must be any other in preference to that in which he is born to live and labor for 
another ; in" which he must look up the faculties of his nature, contribute, as far as 
depends on his individual endeavors, to the evanishment of the human race, or en- 
tail his own miserable condition on the endless generations proceeding from him. 
With the morals of the jieople, their industry is also destroyed ; for, in a warm 
climate, no man will labor for himself who can make another labor for him. This 
is so true, that of the proprietors of slaves a very small proportion, indeed, are 
ever seen to labor. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure, when we 
have removed their only firm basis — a conviction in the minds of the people that 
these liberties are the gift of God ? that they are not to be violated but by his 
wraths Indeed. I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his 
justice cannot sleep forever; that considering numbers, nature, and natural means 
only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation is among pos- 
sible events; that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The 
Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest." 

While Virginia was yet a Colony, in 1774, she held a Convention to 
appoint delegates to attend the first general Congress, which was to 
assemble, and did assemble, in Philadelphia, in September of the same 
year. Before that convention, Mr. Jefferson made an exposition of the 
rights of British America, in which he said : 

" The abolition of domestic slavery is the greatest object of desire in these Colo- 
nies, where it was unhappily introduced in their infant State. But previous to the 
enfranchisement of the slaves, it is necessary to exclude further importations from 
Africa. Yet our repeated attempts to effect this by probihitions, and by imposing 
duties which might amount to i)rohibition, have been hitherto defeated by his 
mnjestj-'s negative ; thus preferring the immediate advantage of a few African cor- 
sairs to the lasting interests of the American States, and the rights of human 
nature, deeply wounded by this infamous practice." 

In the original draft of the Declaration of Independence, of which it 
is well known he was the author, we find this charge against the King 
of Great Britain : 



80UTHEKN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 95 

" He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred 
rights of life and liberty, in the persons of a distant people who never ofleuded 
him, captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur 
miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the oppro- 
brium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian King of Great Britain. 
Determined to keep a market where men should be bought and sold, he has at 
length prostituted his negative for suppressing any legislative attempt to prohibit 
and restrain this execrable commerce." 

Hear him further ; he says : 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that 
they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights ; that among 
these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; that to secure these rights, 
governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the con- 
sent of the governed." 

Under date of August 7th, 1785, in a letter to Dr. Price, of London, 
he says : 

" Northward of the Chesapeake you may find, here and there, an opponent of 
your doctrine, as you may find, here and there, a robber and murderer; but in no 
great number. Emancipation is put into such a train, that in a few years there 
will be no slaves northward of Maryland. In Maryland I do not find such a dispo- 
sition to begin the redress of this enormity, as in Virginia. This is the next State 
to which we may turn our eyes for the interesting spectacle of justice in confiict 
with avarice and oppression : a conflict wherein the sacred side is gaining daily 
recruits from the influx into offlce of young men grown up, and growing up. These 
have sucked in the principles of liberty, as it were, with their mother's milk ; and 
it is to them I look with anxiety to turn the fate of the question." 

In another letter, written to a friend in 1814, he made use of the fol- 
lowing language : 

"Your favor of July 31st was duly received, and read with peculiar pleasure. 
The sentiments do honor to the head and heart of the writer. Mine on the subject 
of the slavery of negroes have long since been in the possession of the public, and 
time has only served to give them stronger root. The love of justice and the love 
of country p"lcad equally the cause of these people, and it is a reproach to us that 
they should have pleaded it so lonj; in vain." 

Again, he says : 

"What an incomprehensible machine is man! who can endure toil, famine, 
stripes imprisonment, and death itself, in vindication of his own liberty ; and the 
next moment be deaf to all those motives whose power supported him through his 
trial, and inflict on his fellow man a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with 
more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose." 

Throughout the South, at the present day, especially among slave- 
holders, negroes are almost invariably spoken of as "goods and chat- 
tels," "property," " human cattle." In our first quotation from Jefter- 
son's works, we have seen that he spoke of the blacks as citizens. "We 
shall now hear him speak of them as brethren. He says : 

" We must waitwith patience the workings of an overruling Providence, and hope 
that that is preparing the deliverance of these our brethren. When the measure 
of their tears shall be full, when their groans shall have involved Heaven itself m 
darkness, doubtless a God of justice will awaken to their distress. Nothing is moro 
certainly written in the Book of Fate, than that this people shall be free. 



96 SOUTHEKN TESTEVIONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 

In a letter to James Heaton, on this same subject, dated May 20, 1826, 
only six weeks before his death, he says : 

"My sentiments have been forty years before the public. Had I repeated 
them forty times, they would have only become the more stale and thread- 
bare. Although I shall not live to see them consummated, they will not die 
with Tie." 

From the Father of the Declaration of Independence, we now turn to 
thfe Father of the Constitution. We will listen to 

THE VOICE OF MADISON. 

In the Convention that drafted the Constitution, Mr. Madison 

" Thought it wrong to admit in the Constitution the idea that there could be 
property in men." 

Advocating the abolition of the slave-trade, as we find in the 42d No. 
of the Federalist, he said : 

" It were, doubtless, to be wished, that the power of prohibiting the importation 
of slaves, had not been postponed until the year 1808, or rather, that it had been 
euffered to have immediate operation. But it is not difficult to account, either for 
this restriction on the general government, or for the manner in which the whole 
clause is expressed. It ought to be considered as a great point gained in favor of 
humanity, that a period of twenty years may terminate forever within these States, 
a traffic which bus so long and so loudly upbraided the barbarism of modern 
policy ; that within that period it will receive a considerable discouragement from 
the Federal Government, and may be totally abolished by a concurrence of the 
few States which continue the unnatural traffic, in the prohibitory example which 
has been given by so great a majority of the Union." 

In the 39th No. of the Federalist, he says : 

" The first qnestion that offers itself is, whether the general form and aspect of 
the governreent be strictly Republican. It is evident that no other form would be 
reconcilable with the genius of the people of America, and with the fundamental 
principles of the Revolution, or with that honorable determination which animates 
every votary of freedom, to re^t all our political experiments on the capacity of 
mankind for self-government." 

Again, he contends that : 

•' Where slavery exists, the Republican theory becomes still more fallacious." 

On another occasion, he says : 

''We have seen the mere distinction of color made, in the most enlightened 
period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man 
over man." 

THE VOICE OF MONROE, 

In a speech in the Virginia Convention, Mr. Monroe said : , 

"We have found that this evil has preyed upon the very vitals of the Union, and 
has been prejudicial to all the States in which it ha.s existed." 

THE VOICE OF HENEY. 

The eloquent Patrick Henry, in a letter dated January 18, 1773, asks: 



SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 97 

"Is it not a little surprising tliat the professors of Christianity, whose chief 
excellence consists in softening the human heart, in cherishing and improving its 
finer feelings, should encourage a practice so totally repugnant to the lirst impres- 
sions of right and wrong ? What adds to the wonder is, that this abominable 
practice has been introduced in the most enliglitened ages. Times that seem to 
have pretensions to boast of high improvements in the arts and sciences, and 
refined morality, have brought iuto general use, and guarded by many laws, a 
species of violence and tyranny which our more rude and barbarous, but more 
honest ancestors detested. Is it not amazing that at a time when the rights of 
liumanity are defined and understood with precision, in a country above all others 
fond of liberty— that in such an age and in such a country, we find men professing 
a religion the most mild, humane, gentle, and generous, adopting such a principle, 
as repugnant to humanity as it is inconsistent with the Bible, and destructive to 
liberty '! Every thinking, honest man rejects it in speculation. How free in prac- 
tice from conscientious motives ! Would any one believe that I am master of 
slaves of my own purchase ? I am drawn along by the general inconvenience of 
living here without them. I will not, I cannot justify it. However culpable my 
conduct, I will so far pay my devoir to virtue as to own the excellence and recti- 
tude of her precepts, and lament my want of conformity to them. I believe a time 
will come when an opportunity will be offered to abolish this lamentable evil. 
Everything we can do is to improve it, if it happens in our day ; if not, let us trans- 
mit to our descendants, together with our slaves, a pity for their unhappy lot, and 
an abhorrence for slavery. If we cannot reduce this wished-for reformation to 
practice, let us treat the unhappy victims with lenity. It is the furthest advance 
we can make toward justice. It is a debt we owe to the purity of our religion, 
to show that it is at variance with that law which warrants slavery." 

Again, this great oratoi* says " 

" It would rejoice my very soul, that every one of my fellow-beings was eman- 
cipated. We ought to lament and deplore the necessity of holding our fellow- 
men in bondage. Believe me ; I shall honor the Quakers for their noble eflbrts to 
abolish slavery." 

THE VOICE OF EANDOLPn. 

That very ecceutric genius, John Eaudolpb, of Eoanoke, in a letter to 
William Gibbous, in 1820, says : 

"With unfeigned respect and regard, and as sincere a deprecation on the exten- 
sion of slavery aud its horrors, as any other man, be him whom he may, I am your 
friend, in the literal sense of that much abused word. I say much abused, because 
it is applied to the leagues of vice and avarice and ambition, instead of good will 
toward man from love of him who is the Prince of Peace." 

While in Congress, he said : 

" Sir, I envy neither the heart nor the head of that man from the North who 
rises here to defend slavery on principle." 

It is well known tliat he emancipated all his negroes. The following 
lines from his will are well worth perusing aud preserving : 

■' I give to my slaves their freedom, to which my conscience tells me they are 
justly entitled. It has a long time been a matter of the deepest regret to me that 
the circumstances under which I inherited them, and the obstacles thrown in the 
way by the laws of the land, have prevented my emancipating them in my life- 
time, which it is my full intention to do in case I can accomplish it." 

THOMAS M. EANDOLPH. 

In an address to the Virginia Legislature, in 1820, Gov. Eandolph 
said : 

" We have been far outstripped by States to whom nature has been far less 

5 



98 SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST 8LAVEKT. 

bountiful. It is painful to consider what might have been, under other cii'cum- 
stances, the amount of general wealth in Virginia." 

THOMAS JEFFEESON RANDOLPH. 

In 1832, Mr. Randolph, of Albemarle, in the Legislature of Virginia, 
used the following most graphic and emphatic language : 

" I agree with gentlemen in the necessity of arming the State for internal 
defence. I will unite with them in any effort to restore confidence to the public 
mind, and to conduce to the sense of the safety of our wives and our children. 
Yet, sir, I must ask upon whom is to fall the burden of this defence ? Not upon 
the lordly masters of their hundred slaves, who will never turn out except to retire 
with their families when danger threatens. No, sir ; it is to fall upon the less 
wealthy class of our citizens, chiefly upon the non-slaveholder. I have known 
patrols turned out when there was not a slaveholder among them ; and this is the 
practice of the country. I have slept in times of alarm quiet in bed, without having 
a thought of care, while these individuals, owning none of this property themselves, 
were patrolling under a compulsory process, for a pittance of seventy-five cents 
for twelve hom-s, the very curtilage of my house, and guarding that property which 
was alike dangerous to them and myself. After all, this is but an expedient. As 
this population becomes more numerous, it becomes less productive. Your guard 
must be increased, until finally its profits will not pay for the expense of its sub- 
jection. Slavery has the effect of lessening the free population of a country. 

'' The gentleman has spoken of the increase of the female slaves being a part of 
the pi'ofit. It is admitted ; but no great evil can be averted, no good attained, 
without some inconvenience. It may be questioned how far it is desirable to fos- 
ter and encourage this branch of profit. It is a practice, and an increasing prac- 
tice, in parts of Virginia, to rear slaves for market. How can an honorable mind, 
a patriot, and a lover of his country, bear to see this Ancient Dominion, rendered 
illustrious by the noble devotion and patriotism of her sons in the cause of liberty, 
converted into one grand menagerie, where men are to be reared for the market, 
like oxen for the shambles? Is it better, is it not worse, than the slave trade — that 
trade which enlisted the labor of the good and wise of every creed, and every clime, 
to abolish it ? The trader receives the slave, a stranger in language, aspect, and 
manners, from the merchant who has brought him from the interior. The ties of 
father, mother, husband, and child, have all been rent in twain ; before he receives 
him, his soul has become callous. But here, sir, individuals whom the master has 
known from infancy, whom he has seen sporting in the innocent gambols of child- 
hood, who have been accustomed to look to him for protection, he tears from the 
mother's arms and sells into a strange country among strange people, subject to 
cruel taskmasters. 

" He has attempted to justify slavery here, because it exists in Africa, and has 
stated that it exists all over the world. Upon the same principle he could justify 
Mahometanism, with its plurality of wives, petty wars for plunder, robbery, and 
murder, or any other of the abominations and enormities of savage tribes. Does 
slavery exist in any part of civilized Europe ? No, sir, in no part of it." 

PEYTON EANDOLPn. 

On the 20th of October, 1774, while Congress was in session in Phila- 
delphia, Peyton Randolph, President, the following resolution, among 
otliers, was unanimously adopted : 

"That we will neither import nor purchase any slaves imported after the first 
day of December next ; after which time we will wholly discontinue the slave trade, 
and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, nor will we hire our vessels, nor sell 
our commodities or manufactures, to those who are concerned in it." 

EDMUND RANDOLPH. 

The Constitution of the United States contains the following pro- 
vision : 

" No person held to service or labor in another State, under the laws thereof, 
escaping to another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be dis- 



SOUTHEEN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVEKT. 99 

charged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up ou claim of the party 
to whom such service or labor may be due." 

To the studious attention of those Ycandals who contend that the 
above provision requires the rendition of fugitive slaves, we respectfully 
commend the following resolution, which, it will be observed, was unani- 
mously adopted : 

" Ou motion of Mr. Eandolph, the word ' servitude ' was struck out, and ' service ' 
unanimously inserted— the former being thought to express the condition of slaves, 
and the latter the obligation of/r«e persons." — Madison Papers, vol. iii. p. 1569. 

Well done for the Eandolphs ! 

THE VOICE OF OLAT. 

Henry Clay, whom nearly everybody loved, and at the mention of 
whose name the American heart always throbs with emotions of grate- 
ful remembrance, said, in an address before the Kentucky Colonization 
Society, in 1829 : 

" It is believed that nowhere in the farming portion of the United States would 
slave labor be generally employed, if the proprietor were not tempted to raise 
slaves by the high price of the Southern market, which keeps it up in his own." 

In the United States Senate, in 1850, he used the following memo- 
rable words : 

" I am extremely sorry to hear the Senator from Mississippi say that he requires, 
first the exten;;ion of the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific, and also that he 
is not satisfied with that, but requires, if I understand him correctly, a positive pro- 
vision for the admission of slavery south of that line. And now, sir, coming from 
a slave State, as I do, I owe it to myself, I owe it to truth, I owe it to the subject, 
to say that no earthly power could induce me to vote for a specific measure for the 
introduction of slavery where it had not before existed, either south or north of 
that line. Coming as I do from a slave State, it is my solemn, deliberate and well- 
matured determination that no power, no earthly power, shall compel me to vote 
for the positive introduction of slavery either south or north of that line. Sir, 
while you reproach, and justly, too, our British ancestors for the introduction of 
this institution upon the continent of America, I am, for one, unwilling that the 
posterity of the present inhabitants of California and of New Mexico shall reproach 
us for doing just what we reproach Great Britain for doing to us. If the citizens of 
those territories choose to establish slavery, and if they come here with constitu- 
tions establishing slavery, I am for admitting them with such provisions in their 
constitutions ; but then it will be their own work, and not ours, and their posterity 
will have to reproach them, and not us, for forming constitutions allowing the insti- 
tution of slavery to exist among them. These are my views, sir, and 1 choose to 
express them ; and I care not how extensively or universally they are known." 

Hear him further ; he says : 

" So long as God allows the vital current to flow through my veins, I will never, 
never, never, by word or thought, by mind or will, aid in admitting one rood of free 
territory to the everlasting cmse of human bondage." 

Blest is the memory of noble Harry of the West ! 

THE VOICE OF BENTON. 

In his " Thirty Years' View," Thomas H. Benton says : 

"My opposition to the extension of slavery dates further back than 1844 — 
forty years further back ; and as this is a suitable time for a general declaration, and 



100 SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 

a sort of general conscience delivery, I will say that my opposition to it dates from 
1804, when I was a student at law in the State of Tennessee, and studied the subject 
of African slavery in an Americanbook— a Virginian book— Tucker's edition of Black- 
stone's Commentaries." 

Again, in a speech delivered in St. Louis, ontlieSdof N"ovember, 1856, 
ho says : 

" I look at white people, and not at black ones ; I look to the peace and reputa- 
tion of the race to which I belong. I look to the peace of this land — the world's 
last hope for a free government on the earth. One of the occasions on which I saw 
Henry Clay rise higher than I thought I ever saw him before, was when in the de- 
bate on the admission of California, a dissolution was apprehended if slavery was 
not carried into this Territory, where it never was. Then Mr. Clay rising, loomed 
colossally in the Senate of the United States, as he rose declaring that for no earthly 
purpose, no earthly object, could he carry slavery into places where it did not exist 
before. It was a great and proud day for Mr. Clay, toward the latter days of his 
life, and if an artist could have been there to catch his expression as he uttered 
that sentiment, with its reflex on his face, and his countenance beaming with firm- 
ness of purpose, it would have been a glorious moment in which to transmit him to 
posterity — his countenance all alive and luminous with the ideas that beat in his 
bosom. That was a proud day. I could have wished that I had spoken the same 
words. I speak them now, telling you they were his, and adopting them as my 
own." 

THE VOICE OF MASOjST. 

Colonel Mason, a leading and distinguished member of the Convention 
that formed the Constitution, from Virginia, when the provision for pro- 
hibiting the importation of slaves was under consideration, said: 

" The present question concerns not the importing States alone, but the whole 
Onion. Slavery discourages arts and manufactures. The poor despise labor when 
performed by slaves. They prevent the emigration of whites, who really enrich and 
strengthen a country. They produce the most pernicious effect on manners. 
Every master of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of heaven 
on a country. As nations cannot be rewarded or punished in the next world, they 
must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes and effects, Providence punishes 
national sins by national calamities. He lamented that some of our Eastern 
brethren had, from a lust of gain, embarked in this nefarious trafBc. As to the 
States being in possession of the right to import, this was the case with many other 
rights now to be properly given up. He held it essential, in every point of view, 
that the General Government should have power to prevent the increase of slavery." 

THE VOICE OF MCDOWELL. 

In 1832, Gov. McDowell used this language in the Virginia Legis- 
lature : 

" Who that looks to this unhappy bondage of an unhappy people, in the midst of 
our society, and thinks of its incidents or issues, but weeps over it as a curse as 
great upon him who inflicts it as upon him who suffers it? Sir, you may place the 
slave wliere you please— you may dry up, to your uttermost, the fountains of his 
feelings, the springs of his thought — you may close upon his mind every avenue of 
knowledge, and cloud it over with artificial night— you may yoke him to your 
labors, as the ox, which liveth only to work and worketh only to live— you may 
put hhn under any process which, without destroying his value as a slave, will de- 
base and crush him as a rational being— you may do this, and the idea that he 
was born to be frei^ will survive it all. It is allied to his hope of immortality— it is 
the ethereal part of his nature which oppression cannot rend. It is a torch lit up 
m his soul by the hand of Deity, and never meant to be extin"-uished by the hand 
of man.' 

THE VOICE OF IREDELL. 

In the debates of the North Carolina Convention, Mr. Iredell, after- 
wards a Judge of tlie United States Supreme Court, said : 



SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 101 

"When tne entire abolition of slavery takes place, it will be an event wbich 
must be pleasing to every generous mind, and every friend of human natui-c." 

THE VOICE OF PINKXEY. 

William Pinkney, of Maryland, in the House of Delegates in that State, 
in 1789, made several powerful arguments in favor of the abolition of 
slavery. Here follows a brief extract from one of his speeches : 

"Iniquitous and most dishonorable to Maryland, is that dreary system of partial 
bondage which her laws have hitherto supported with a solicitude worthy of a 
better object, and her citizens, by their practice countenanced. Founded in a dis- 
graceful trafific, to which the parent country lent its fostering aid, from motives of 
interest, but which even she would have disdained to encourage, had England been 
the destined mart of such inhuman merchandise, its continuance is as shameful as 
its origin. 

" I have no hope that the stream of general liberty will forever flow unpolluted 
through the mire of partial bondage, or that thcj' who have been habituated to lord 
it over others, will not, in time, become base enough to let others lord it over them. 
If they resist, it will be the struggle of pride and sellishness, not of principle." 

THE VOICE OF LEIGH, 

In the Legislature of Virginia, in 1832, Mr. Leigh said: 

" I thought till very lately that it was known to everybody that, during the Re- 
volution, and for many years after, the abolition of slavery was a favorite topic 
with many of our ablest statesmen, who entertained with respect all the schemes 
which wisdom or ingenuity could suggest for its accomplishment." 

THE VOICE OF MARSHALL. 

Thomas Marshall, of Fauquier, said, in the Virginia Legislature, in 
1832: 

" Wherefore, then, object to slavery ? Because it is ruinous to the whites- 
retards improvements, roots out an industrious population, banishes the yeomanry 
of the country— deprives the spinner, the weaver, the smith, the shoemaker, the 
carpenter, of employment and support." 

THE VOICE OF BOLLING. 

Philip A. Boiling, of Buckingham, a member of the Legishiture of 
Virginia, in 1832, said : 

" The time will come— and it may be sooner than many are willing to believe- 
when this oppressed and degraded race cannot be held as they now are— when a 
change will be effected, abhorrent, Mr. Speaker, to you, and to the feebngs of 
everv good man. 

" The wounded adder will recoil, and sting the foot that tramples upon it. Ihe 
day is fast approaching, when those who oppose all action upon this subject, and, 
instead of aiding in devising some feasible plan for freeing their country from an 
acknowledged curse, cry ' impossible,' to every plan suggested, will curse their per- 
verseness, and lament their folly." 

THE VOICE OF CHANDLEK. 

Mr. Chandler, of Norfolk, member of the Virginia Legislature, in 

1832, took occasion to say: 

" It is admitted, by all who have addressed this House, that slavery is a curse, 
and an increasing one. That it has been destructive to the lives of our citizens, 
history, with unerring truth, will record. That its future increase will create com- 
motion, cannot be doubted," 



102 SOUTHEKN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 

THE VOICE OF STJMMEES, 

Mr. Summers, of Kanawha, member of the Legislature of Virginia, 
in 1832, said : 

" The evils of this system cannot be enumerated. It were unnecessary to 
attempt it. They glare upon us at every step. When the owner looks to his 
wasted estate, he knows and feels them." 

THE TOICE OF PEESTON. 

In the Legislature of Virginia, in 1832, Mr. Preston said : 

" Sir, Mr. Jefferson, whose hand drew the preamble to the Bill of Eights, has 
eloquently remarked that we had invoked for ourselves the benefit of a principle 
which we had denied to others. He saw and felt that slaves, as men, were 
embraced within this principle." 

THE VOICE OF BIItNEY. 

James G. Birney, of Kentucky, under whom the Abolitionists first 

became a National Party, and for whom they voted for President in 

1844, giving him 66,304 votes, says : 

" I allow not to human laws, be they primary or secondary, no matter by what 
numbers, or with what solemnities ordained, the least semblance of right to esta- 
blish slaverv, to make property of my fellow, created, equally with myself, in the 
image of God. Individually, or as political communities, men have no more right 
to enact slavery, than they "have to enact murder or blasphemy, or incest or adul- 
tery. To establish slavery is to dethrone right, to trample on justice, the only true 
foundation of government. Governments exist not for the destruction of liberty, 
bi;t for its defence ; not for the annihilation of men's rights, but their preservation. 
Do they incorporate in their organic law the element of injustice ? — do they live by 
admitting it in practice ? Then do they destroy their own foundation, and absolve 
all men from the duty of allegiance. Is any man so besotted as, for a moment, to 
suppose that the slaveholder has an atom" of right to his slave ; as that the slave 
has resting on him an atom of obligation to obey the laws that enslave him, that 
rob him of everything — of himself? No one ; else why do all just men of all coun- 
tries rejoice when they hear that the oppressed of any country have achieved their 
liberty, at whatever cost to their tyrants ?" 

THE VOICE OF DELAWAEE. 

Strong anti-slavery sentiments had become popular in Delaware as 

early as 1785. With Maryland and Missouri, it may now be ranked as 

merely a semi-slave State. Mr. McLane, a member of Congress from this 

State, in 1825, said : 

" I shall not imitate the example of other gentlemen by making professions of 
ray love of liberty and abhorrence of slavery, not, however, because I do not 
entertain them. I am an enemy to slavery." 

TEE VOICE OF MAEYLAND. 

Slavery has little vitality in Maryland. Baltimore, the greatest city 
of the South — greatest because freest — has a population of more than 
two Imndred thousand souls, and yet less than three thousand of these 
are slaves. In spite of all the unjust and oppressive statutes enacted by 
the oligarchy, the non-slaveholders, who with the exception of a small 
number of slaveholding emancipationists, may in truth be said to be the 



SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVEEY. 103 

only class of really respectable and patriotic citizens in the South, have 
wisely determined that their noble State shall be freed from the sin and 
the shame, the crime and the curse of slavery ; and in accordance with 
this determination, long since formed, they are giving every possible 
encouragement to free white labor, thereby, very properly, rendering 
the labor of slaves both unprofitable and disgraceful. The formation of 
an Abolition Society in this State, in 1789, was the result of the influ- 
ence of the masterly speeches delivered in the House of Delegates, by 
the Hon. William Pinkney, whose undying testimony we have already 
placed on record. Nearly seventy years ago, this eminent lawyer and 
statesman declared to the people of America, that if they did not mark 
out the bounds of slavery, and adopt measures for its total extinction, it 
would finally " work a decay of the spirit of liberty in the free States." 
Further, he said that, " by the eternal principles of natural justice, no 
master in the State has a right to hold his slave in bondage a single 
hour." In 1787, Luther Martin, of this State, said : 

" Slavery is inconsistent with tlie genius of republicanism, and has a tendency to 
destroy those principles on which it is supported, as it lessens the sense of the 
equal rights of mankind, and habituates us to tyranny and oppression." 

THE VOIOK OF VIEGINIA. 

After introducing the unreserved and immortal testimony of Wash- 
ington, Jefferson, Madison, Henry, and the other great men of the Old 
Dominion, against the institution of slavery, it may, to some, seem quite 
superfluous to back the cause of Freedom by arguments from other Vir- 
ginia abolitionists ; but this State, notwithstanding all her more modern 
manners and inJiumanity, has been so prolific of just views and noble 
sentiments, that we deem it eminently fit and proper to blazon many of 
them to the world as the redeeming features of her history. An Aboli- 
tion Society was formed in this State in 1791. In a memorial which 
the members of this Society presented to Congress, they pronounced 
slavery " not only an odious degradation, but an outrageous violation of 
one of the most essential rights of human nature, and utterly repugnant 
to the precepts of the Gospel." A Bill of Rights, imanimously agreed 
upon by the Virginia Convention of June 12, 1776, holds— 

" That all men are, by nature, equally free and independent ; 

" Tliat Government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common benefit, protec- 
tion, and security, of the People, Nation, or Community ; 

" That elections of members to serve as representatives of the people in assembly 
ought to be free ; 

" That all men having sufficient evidence of permanent common interest with, and 
attachment to, the community, have the right of suffrage, and cannot be taxed or 
deprived of their property, for public uses, without their own consent or that of 
their representatives so elected, nor bound by any law to which they have not in 
like manner assented, for the public good ; 

" That the freedom of the Press is one of the greatest bulwarks of Liberty, and 
can never be restrained but by despotic Governments ; 

" That no free Government or the blessing of Liberty can be preserved to any 
people, but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and 
virtue, and by a frequent recurrence to fundamental principles." 



104 SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVEET. 

The " Virginia Society for the Abolition of Slavery," organized in 

1791, addressed Congress in these words: 

" Your memorialists, fully aware that righteousness exalteth a nation, and that 
slavery is not only an odious degradation, but an outrageous violation of one of the 
most essential rights of human nature, and utterly repugnant to the precepts of 
the Gospel, wliich lircatla-s ' peace on earth and good will to men, lament that a 
practice so inconsistent with true policy and the inalienable rights of men, should 
subsist in so enlightened an age, and amon" a people professing that all mankmd 
are, by nature, equally entitled to freedom. ' 

THE VOICE OF XOETH CAEOLIXA. 

If the question. Slavery or No Slavery, could be fairly presented 
for the decision of the legal voters of North Carolina at the next 
popular election, wo believe that at least two-thirds of them would 
deposit the Ko Slavery ticket. Perhaps one-fourth of the slaveholders 
themselves would vote it, for the slaveholders in this State are more 
moderate, decent, sensible, and honorable, than the slaveholders in 
either of the adjoining States, or the States furtlier South ; and we know 
that many of them are heartily ashamed of the disreputable occupations 
of slaveholding and slave-breeding in which they are engaged, for we 
have had the assurance from many of their own lips. As a matter of 
course, all the non-slaveholders, who are so greatly in the majority, 
would vote to suppress the degrading system, Avhich has kept them so 
long in poverty and ignorance, with the exception of those who are 
complete automatons to the beck and call of their imperious lords and 
masters, the major-generals of the oligarchy. 

How long shall it be before the citizens of North Carolina shall have 
the jjrivilege of expressing, at the ballot-box, their true sentiments with 
rcard to this vexed question? "Why not decide it at the next general 
election? Sooner or later, it must and will be decided — decided cor- 
rectly, too — and the sooner the better. The first Southern State that 
abolishes slavery will do herself an immortal honor. God grant that 
North Carolina may be that State, and soon! There is at least one 
plausible reason why this good old State should be the first to move in 
this imi)ortant matter, and we will state it. On the 20th of May, 1775, 
just one year, one montli and fourteen days prior to the adoption of the 
Jefiersonian Declaration of Independence, by the Continental Congress 
in Philadelpliia, July 4, 177G, the Mecklenburg Declaration of Indepen- 
dence, the autliorship of which is generally attributed to Ephraim Bre- 
vard, wa-s proclaimed in Charlotte, Mecklenburg county. North Carolina, 
and fully ratified in a second Convention of the people of said county, 
held on the 31st of the same month. And here, by the way, we may 
remark, that it is supposed that Mr. Jefferson made use of this last-men- 
tioned document as the basis of his draft of tlie indestructible title-deed 
of oar liberties. There is certainly an identlcalness of language between 
the two papers that is well calculated to strengthen this hypothesis. 



SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVEET. 105 

This, however, is a controversy about which we are but little concerned. 
For present purposes, it is, perhaps, enough for us to know, that on 
the 20th of May, 1776, when transatlantic tyranny and oppression could 
no longer be endured, North Carolina set her sister colonies a most 
valorous and praiseworthy example, and that they followed it. To her 
infamous slaveholding sisters of the South, it is now meet that she 
sliould set another noble example of decency, virtue, and independence. 
Let her at once inaugurate a policy of common justice and humanity — 
enact a system of equitable laws, having due regard to the rights and 
interests of all classes of persons, poor whites, negroes, and nabobs, and 
the surrounding States will ere long applaud her measures, and adopt 
similar ones for the governance of themselves. 

Another reason, and a cogent one, why North Carolina should aspire 
to become the first free State of the South is this: Tlie first slave State 
that makes herself respectable by casting out the "mother of harlots," 
and by rendering enterprise and industry honorable, will immediately 
receive a large accession of most worthy citizens from other States in 
the Union, and thus lay a broad foundation of permanent political power 
and prosperity. Intelligent white farmers from the Middle and New 
England States will flock to our more congenial clime, eager to give 
thirty dollars per acre for the very lands that are now a drug in the 
market because nobody wants them at the rate of five doUars per acre ; 
an immediate and powerful impetus will be given to commerce, manu- 
factures, and all the industrial arts; science and literature will be 
revived, and every part of the State will reverberate with the triumphs 
of manual and intellectual labor. 

In a pecuniary point of view, we of North Carolina are, at this present 
time, worth less than either of the four adjoining States; lot us abolish 
slavery at the beginning of the next regular decade of years, and if our 
example is not speedily followed, we shall, on or before the 4th of July, 
1876, be enabled to purchase the whole of Virginia and South Carolina, 
including, perhaps, the greater part of Georgia. An exclusive lease of 
liberty for ten years would unquestionably make us the Empire State 
of the South. But we have no disposition to debar others from the 
enjoyment of liberty or any other inalienable right; we ask no special 
favor ; what we demand for ourselves we are willing to concede to our 
neighbors. Hereby we make application for a lease of freedom for 
ten years ; shall we have it? May God enable us to secure it, as we 
believe He will. We give fair notice, however, that if we get it for 
ten years, we shall, with the approbation of Heaven, keep it twenty- 
forty — a thousand — forever ! 

We transcribe the Mecklenburg Eesolutions, which, it will be ob- 
served, acknowledge the " inherent and inalienable rights of man," and 
"declare ourselves a free and independent people, are, and of right 



106 SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST BLAVEET. 

ought to be, a, sovereign and self-governing association, under the con- 
trol of no power other than that of our God, and the general govern- 
ment of the Congress." 

MEOKLENBXIHG DECLAEATIOK OF INDEPENDENCE, 

As proclaimed in the town of Charlotte, North Carolina, May 20th, 
1775, and ratified by the County of Mecklenburg, in Convention, May 
31st, 1775. 

"I. Resolved — That whosoever, directly or indirectly, abetted, or in anyway, 
form or manner, countenanced the unchartered and dangerous invasion of our 
rights as claimed by Great Britain, is an enemy to this country, to America, and to 
the inherent and inalienable rights of man. 

" II. Resolved— Thiit we the citizens of Mecklenburg County, do hereby dissolve 
the political bauds which have connected us to the mother country, and hereby 
absolve ourselves from all allegiance to the British Crown, and abjure all political 
counection, contract or association with that nation, who have wantonly trampled 
on our rights and liberties, and inhumanly shed the blood of American patriots at 
Lexington. 

'• III. Resolved — That we do hereby declare ourselves a free and independent 
people, are, and of right ought to be, a sovereign and self-governing association, 
under the control of no power other than that of our God, and the general govern^ 
ment of the Congress ; to the maintenance of which independence, we solemnly 
pledge to each other our mutual cooperation, our lives, our fortunes, and our most 
sacred honor. 

" IV. Resolved — That as we now acknowledge the existence and control of no 
law or legal officer, civil or military, within this county, we do hereby ordain and 
adopt, as a rule of life, all, each, and every of our former laws — wherein, never- 
theless, the crown of Great Britain never can be considered as holding rights, 
privileges, immunities or authority therein." 

Had it not been for slavery, which, witli all its other blighting and 
degrading influences, stifles and subdues every noble impulse of the 
heart, this consecrated spot would long since have been marked by an 
enduring monument, whose grand proportions should bear witness that 
the virtues of a noble ancestry are gratefully remembered by an emulous 
and appreciative posterity. Yet, even as tilings are, we are not without 
gonniue consolation. Tlie star of hope and promise is beghming to 
beam briglitly over the long-obscured horizon of the South ; and we are 
firm in tlie belief, tliat freedom, wealth, and magnanimity, will soon do 
justice to the memory of those fearless ])atriots, whose fair fame has 
been suftered to molder amidst the multifarious abominations of slavery, 
poverty, ignorance and grovelling selfishness. 

In the Provincial Convention held in North Carolina, in August, 
1774, in wliich there were sixty-nine delegates, representing nearly 
every county in tlio province, it was — 

J'Resolved-'rhnt we will not import any slave or slaves, or purchase any slave 
w«rw V"''^.'"'^?'' ,"■■, '""""gi't into the Province by others, from any part of the 
world, after the hrst day of November next." 

In Iredell's Statutes, revised by Martin, it is stated that, 
decbn-n''gtto m' gft sTavf s."" '"' '''' '' '" ^^^ '''''''' ^"'' '' '"^^ ^^-l'^«or, 



S0T3THEKN TESTIMONT AGAINST SLAVERY. 107 

That there is no legal slavery ia the Southern States, and tliat slavery 
nowhere can be legalized, any more than theft, arson or murder can be 
legalized, has been vu-tually admitted by some of the most profound 
Southern jurists themselves ; and we will here digress so far as to fur- 
nish the testimony of one or two eminent lawyers, not of North Caro- 
ina, upon this point. 

In the debate in the United States Senate, in 1850, on the Fugitive 

Slave Bill, Mr. Mason, of Virginia, objected to Mr. Dayton's amendment, 

providing for a trial by jury, because, said he — 

" A trial by jury necessarily carries with it a trial of the whole right, and a trial 
of the right to service will be gone into, according to all the forms of the Court, 
in determining upon any other fact. Then, again, it is proposed, as a part of the 
proof to be adduced at the hearing, after the fugitive has been re-captnrcd, that evi- 
dence shall be brought by the claimant to show that slavery is established in the State 
from which the fugitive has absconded. Now this very thing, in a recent case in 
the city of New York, was required by one of the judges of that State, which case 
attracted the attention of the authorities of Maryland, and against which they pro- 
tested. In that case the State judge went so far as to say that the only mode of 
proving it was by reference to the Statute book. Such proof is required in the 
Senator's amendment ; and if he means by this that proof shall be brought that 
slavery is established by existing laws, it is impossible to comply with the requisi- 
tion, for no such law can be produced, I apprehend, in any of the slave States. I 
am not aware that there is a single State in which the institution is established by 
positive law.' 

Judge Clarke, of Mississippi says : 

" In this State the legislature have considered slaves as reasonable and account- 
able beings ; and it should be a stigma upon the character of the State, and a 
reproach to the administration of justice, if the life of a slave could be taken with 
impunity, or if he could be murdered in cold blood, without subjecting the offend- 
er to the highest penalty known to the criminal jurisprudence of the country. 
Has the slave no rights, because he is deprived of his freedom ? He is still a 
human being, and possesses all those rights of which he is not deprived by the 
positive provisions of the law. The right of the master exists not by force of the 
law of nature or nations, but by virtue only of the positive law of the State." 

The Hon. Judge Ruffin, of North Carolina, says : 

" Arguments drawn from the well-established principles, which confer and res- 
train the authority of the parent over the child, the tutor over the pupil, the mas- 
ter over the apprentice, have been pressed on us. The Court docs not recognize 
their application ; there is no likeness between the cases ; they are in opposition 
to each other, and there is an impassable gulf between them. The diflerence is 
that which exists between freedom and slavery, aud a greater cannot be imagined. 
In the one, the end in view is the happiness of the youth, born to equal rights with 
that governor on whom the duty devolves of training the young to usefulness in a 
station which he is afterward to assume among freemen. To such an end, and 
with such a subject, moral and intellectual instruction seem the natural means, and, 
for the most part, they are found to suffice. Moderate force is superadde<l only 
to make the others effectual. If that fail, it is better to leave the party to his own 
headstrong passions, and the ultimate correction of the law, than to allow it to be 
immoderately inflicted bya private person. With slavery it is far otherwise. Ihe 
end is the profit of the master, his security, and the pubhc safety ; the subject, one 
doomed, in his own person and his posterity, to live without knowledge, and with- 
out the capacity to make anything his own and to toil that another may reap tlie 
fruits. What moral considerations shall be addressed to such a being to convince 
him, what it is impossible but that the most stupid must feel and know can never bo 
true, that he is thus to labor upon a principle of natural duty, or for the sake of his 
own personal happiness ? Such services can only be expected from one who has 
no will of his own ; who surrenders his will in implicit obedience to that of ano- 
ther. Such obedience is the consequence only of uncontrolled authority over the 
body. There is nothing else which can operate to produce the effect. The pow(?t 



108 SOUTHEBN TESTIMONY AGAINST 8LAVEKY. 

of the master must be absolute to render the submission of the slave perfect. I 
most freely confess my sense of the harshness of this proposition. I feel it as 
deeply as any man can ; and as a principle of moral right, every person in his 
retirement must repudiate it." 

An esteemed friend, a physician, who was boi'n and bred in Rowan 
country, North CaroUna, and who now resides there, informs us that 
Judge Gaston, who was one of the half dozen statesmen whom the 
Houtli has produced since tlie days of the venerable fathers of the Repub- 
lic, was an avowed abolitionist, and that he published an address to the 
people of North Carolina, delineating, in a masterly manner, the mate- 
rial, moral and social disadvantages of slavery. "Where is that address ? 
Has it been suppressed by the oligarchy ? The fact that slaveholders 
have, from time to time, made strenuous efforts to expunge the senti- 
ments of freedom which now adorn the works of nobler men than the 
noble Gaston, may, perhaps, fully account for the oblivious state into 
which his patriotic effort seems to have fallen, 

Note. — Three or four months after the above was published — up to 
which time this work in its first form had passed through several edi- 
tions — Prof. Iledrick had the kindness to hand us the address, delivered, 
many years ago, before the Literary Societies of the University of North 
Carolina, by 

Judge Gaston, who, with much force, says : 

" Disguise the truth as we may, and throw the blame where we will, it is slavery 
which, more than any other cause, keeps us back in the career of improvement. 
It stifles industry and represses enterprise — it is fatal to economy and providence — 
it discourages skill — impairs our strength as a community, and poisons morals at 
tho fountain head. How this evil is to be encountered, how subdued, is indeed a 
ditlicult and delicate inquiry, which this is not the time to examine, nor the occa- 
sion to discuss. I felt, however, that I could not discharge my duty, without 
referring to this subject, as one which ought to engage the prudence, moderation, 
and lirnmess of those who sooner or later, must act decisively upon it." 

In the course of an oration which he delivered in 1830, Benjamin 

Swaim, an eminent lawyer of North Carolina, asks — 

" la it nothing to ns, that seventeen hundred thousand of the people of our coun- 
try are doomed illegally to the most abject and vile slavery that was ever tole- 
rated on the face of the earth ? Are Carolinians deaf to the piercing cries of 
humanity ? Are they insensible to the demands of justice ? Let any man of spirit 
and ft-eling for a moment cast his thoughts over the land of slavery — think of the 
nakedness of some, the hungry yearniugs of others, the flowing tears and heaving 
sigliH of parting relations, the waitings of lamentation and woe, the bloody cut of 
the keen lasli, and the frightful scream that rends the very skies — and all this to 
gratify aniliilion, lust, pride, avarice, vanity, and other depraved feelings of the 
human heart. Indeed the worst is not generally known. Were all the miseries, 
the horrors of slavery, to burst at once into view, a peal of sevenfold thunder could 
scarce strike greater alarm." 

THE VOICE OF SOUTH OAEOLINA. 

Poor South Carolina ! Folly is her nightcap ; fanaticism is her day- 
dream ; fire-eating is her pastime. She has lost her better judgment^ 
tho dictates of reason and philosophy have no influence upon her 



SOUTHERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 109 

actions. Like the wife who is pitiably infatuated witli a drunken, worth- 
less husband, she still clings, with unabated love, to the cause of her 
shame, her misery, and her degradation. 

A Iventuchian has recently expressed his opinion of this State in the 
following language : 

"South Carolina is bringing: herself irrecoverably into public contempt. It is 
impossible for any impartial lover of his country, for any just, thinking man, to 
witness her senseless and quenchless malignancy against the Union without the 
most immeasurable disgust and scorn. She is one vast hot-bed of disunion. Her 
people think and talk of nothing else. She is a festering mass of treason." 

In 1854, tliere were assessed for taxation in South Carolina, 

Acres of Land 17,289,359 

Valued at $22,836,374 

Average value per acre $1 32 

At the same time there were in New Jersey, 

Acres of Land 6,324,800 

Valued at $153,161,619 

Average value per acre $28 76 

We hope the slaveholders will look, first on that picture, and then on 
this ; from one or the other, or both, they may glean a ray or two of 
wisdom, which, if duly applied, will be of incalculable advantage to 
them and their posterity. "We trust, also, that the non-slaveholding 
whites will view, with discriminating minds, the different lights and 
shades of these two pictures ; they are the parties most deeply interested ; 
and it is to them we look for the glorious revolution that is to result in 
the permanent establishment of Freedom over the last lingering ruins of 
Slavery. They have the power to retrieve the fallen fortunes of South 
Carolina, to raise her up from tlie loathsome sink of iniquity into which 
slavery has plunged her, and to make her one of the most brilliant stars 
in the great constellation of States. While their minds are occupied 
with other considerations, let them not forget the difference between 
ttcenty-eight dollars and seventy-six cents, the value of land per acre in 
New Jersey, which is a second-rate free State, and one dollar and thirty- 
two cents, the value of land per acre in South Carolina, which is, par 
excellence, the model slave State. The difference between the two sums 
is twenty-seven dollars and forty-four cents, which would amount to 
precisely two thousand seven hundred and forty-four dollars on every 
one hundred acres. To present the subject in another form, the Soutli 
Carolina tract of land, containing two hundred acres, is worth now only 
two hundred and sixty-four dollars, and is depreciating every day. Let 
slavery be abolished, and in the course of a few years, the same tract 
will be worth five thousand seven hundred and fifty-two dollars, with an 
upward tendency. At. this rate, the increment of value on the total 
area of the State will amount to more than three times as much as tlie 
estimated value of the slaves ! 



110 SOUTHERN TESTBIONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 

South Carolina has not always been, nor will she always continue to 
bo, on the wrong side. From Eamsay's History of the State, we learn 

that, in 1774, she 

" Resolved— That his majesty's subjects in North America (without respect to 
color or other accidents) are entitled to all the inherent rights and liberties of his 
natural born subjects within the Kingdom of Great Britain ; that it is their funda- 
mental right, that no man should suffer in his person or property without a fair 
trial, and judgment given by his peers, or by the law of the land." 

During the Revolution, when Baron de Kalb met General Francis 
Marion, the former expressed amazement that so many "Soutli Caro- 
linians were running to take British protection." Marion replied : 

" The people of Carolina form two classes, the rich and the poor. The poor are 
very poor ; the rich, who have slaves to do all their work, give them no employ- 
ment. Unsupported by the rich, they continue poor and low-spirited. The little 
they got is laid out in brandy, not in books and newspapers ; hence they know no- 
thing of the comparative blessings of our country, or of the dangers which threaten 
it ; therefore they care nothing about it. The rich are generally very rich ; afraid 
to Btir lest the British should burn their houses, and carry off their negroes." 

After the war, ho estimated that " poor Carolina lost, througli her 

ignorance, $15,000,000 ; for ignorance begat toryism, and toryism begat 

losses." In regard to the importance of educating the people, he said : 

"Look at the people of New England. Religion has taught them that God 
created men to be hai)py ; to be happy they must have virtue ; that virtue is not to 
be attained without knowledge ; nor knowledge without instruction : nor public 
instruction without free schools; nor free schools without legislative order." 

One of her early writers, under the nom de plume of Philodemus, in 

a political pamphlet published in Charleston in 1784, declares that — 

" Such is the fatal influence of slavery on the human mind, that it almost 
wholly effaces from it even the boasted characteristic of rationality." 

This same writer, speaking of the particular interests of South Caro- 
lina, says: 

"It has been too common with us to search the records of other nations, to 
find precedents that may give sanction to our own errors, and lead us unwarily 
into confusion and ruin. It is our business to consult their histories, not with a 
view to tread right or wrong in their steps, but iu order to investigate the real 
sources of the mischiefs that liave befallen them, and to endeavor to escape the 
rocks which they have all unfortunately split upon. It is paying ourselves but a 
poor compliment, to say that we are incapable of profiting by others, and that, 
with all the information which is to be derived from their fatal experience, it is in 
vain for us to attempt to excel them. K, with all the peculiar advantages of our 
present situation, we are incapable of surpassing our predecessors, we must be a 
degenerate race indeed, and quite unworthy of those singular bounties of Heaven, 
which we are so unskilled or undesirous to turn to our benefit." 

A recent number of Frazer's Magazine contains a well-timed and 

well-written article from the pen of V7illiam Henry Hurlbut of this 

State ; and from it we make the following extract : 

" As all sagacious observers of the operation of the system of slavery have 
demonstrated, the protitable employment of slave-labor is inconsistent with the 
development of agricultural science, and demands a continual supply of new and 
unexhausted soil. The slaveholder, investing his capital in the purchase of the 
laborers themselves, and not merely in soil and machines, paying his free laborers 
out of the protit, must depend for his continued and iirogressive prosperity upon 
the cheapness and facility with which he can transfer his shives to fresh and fertile 
lands. An enormous additional item, namely tli-j price of sl.ives, being added to 



SOUTliERN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. Ill 

the cost of production, all other elements of that cost require to be proportionably 
smaller, or profits fail." 

In an address delivered before the South Carolina Institute, in Char- 
leston, IsTovember 20th, 1856, Mr. B. F. Perry, of Greenville, truthfully 

says : 

" It has been South Carolina's misfortune, in this utilitarian age. to have her 
greatest talents and most powerful energies directed to pursuits, which avail het 
nothing, in the way of wealth and prosperity. In the first settlement of a new 
country, agricultural industry necessarily absorbs all the time and occupation of its 
inhabitants. They must clear the forests and cultivate the earth, in order to make 
their bread. This is their first consideration. Then the mechanical arts and 
manufactures, and commerce, must follow in the footsteps of agriculture, to insure 
either individual or national prosperity. No people can be highly prosperous 
■without them. No people ever have been. Agriculture, alone, will not make or 
sustain a great people. The true policy of every people is to cultivate the earth, 
manufacture its products, and send them abroad, in exchange for those comforts 
and luxuries, and necessaries, which their own country and their own industry 
cannot give or make. The dependence of South Carolina on Europe and the 
Northeru Stales for all the necessaries, comforts and luxuries, which the mechanic 
arts afford, has, in fact, drained her of her wealth, and made her positively poor, 
when compared with her sister States of the Confederacy. It is at once mortifying 
and alarming, to see and reflect on our own dependence in the mechanic arts and 
manufactures, on strangers and foreigners. In the Northern States their highest 
talents and energy have been diversified, and more profitably employed in develop- 
ing the resources of the country, in making new inventions in the mechanic arts, 
and enriching the community with science and literature, commerce and manufac- 
tures." 

THE VOICE OF GEOEGIA. 

Of the States strictly Southern, Georgia is, perhaps, the most thrifty. 
This prosperous condition of the State is mainly ascribable to her hun- 
dred thousand free white laborers — more than eighty-three thousand of 
whom are engaged in agricultural pursuits. In few other slave States 
are the non-slaveholders so little under the domination of the oligarchy. 
At best, however, even in the most liberal slave States, the social posi- 
tion of the non-slaveholding whites is but one short step in advance of 
that of the negroes ; and as there is, on the part of the oligarchy, a con- 
stantly increasing desire and effort to usurp greater power, the more we 
investigate the subject the more fully are we convinced that nothing but 
the speedy and utter annihilation of slavery from the entire nation, can 
save tlie masses of white people in the Southern States from ultimately 
falling to a political level with the blacks — both occupying the most 
abject and galling condition of servitude of which it is possible for tlie 
human mind to conceive. 

Gen. Oglethorpe, under whose management the Colony of Georgia was 

settled, in 1733, was bitterly opposed to the institution of slavery. In a 

letter to Granville Sharp, dated Oct. 13th, 1776, he says : 

"My friends and I settled the Colony of Georgia, and by charter were established 
trustees, to make laws, etc. We determined not to suffer slavery there. But the 
slave merchants and their adherents occasioned us not only much trouble, but at 
last got the then government to favor them. We would not suffer slavery (which 
is against the Gospel, as well as the fundamental law of England) to be authorized 
under our authority ; we refused, as trustees, to make a law permitting such a 
horrid crime. The government, fimling the trustees resolved firmly not to concur 
■with what they believed unjust, took away the charter by which no law could be 
passed without our consent." 



112 60UTHEKN TESTLUONy AGAINST SLAVEET. 

On the 12th of January, 1775, in indorsing the proceedings of the first 

American Congress, among other resolutions, " the Representatives of 

the extensive District of Darien, in the Colony of Georgia," adopted the 

following : 

"5. To show the world that we are not influenced by any contracted or interested 
motives, but a general philanthropy for all mankind, of whatever climate, language 
or complexion, we hereby declare our disapprobation and abhorrence of the unna- 
tural practice of slaverj' in America (however the uncultivated state of our country 
or other specious arguments may plead for it), a practice founded in injustice and 
cruelty, and highly dangerous to our liberties (as well as lives), debasing part of 
our fellow creatures below men, and corrupting the virtue and morals of the rest ; 
and is laying the basis of that liberty we contended for (and which we pray the 
Almighty to continue to the latest posterity), upon a very wrong foundation. We 
therefore resolve, at all times, to use our utmost endeavors for the manumission of 
our slaves in this Colony, upon the most safe and equitable footing for the masters 
and themselves." 

The Hon. Mr. Reid, of this State, in a speech delivered in Congress, 

Feb. 1, 1820, says: 

" I am not the panegyrist of slavery. It is an unnatural state, a dark cloud, 
which obscures half the lustre of our free institutions. For my own part, though 
surrounded by slavery from my cradle to the present moment, yet — 

" ' I hate the touch of servile hands, 

I loathe the slaves who cringe around.' " 

As an accompaniment to those lines, he might have uttered these : 

" I would not have a slave to till my ground ; 
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep 
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth 
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned." 

Thus have we presented a comprehensive summary of the most une- 
quivocal and irrefragable testimony of the South against the iniquitous 
institution of human slavery. What more can we say? What more can 
we do ? We might fill a folio volume with similar extracts ; but we must 
forego the task ; the remainder of our space must be occupied with other 
arguments. In the foregoing excerpts is revealed to us, in language too 
jilain to be misunderstood, the important fact that every truly great and 
good man the South has ever produced, has, with hopeful confidence, 
looked forward to the time when this entire Continent shall be redeemed 
from the crime and the curse of slavery. Our noble self-sacrificing fore- 
fathers have performed their part, and performed it well. They have 
laid U3 a foundation as enduring as the earth itself; in their dying mo- 
ments they admonished us to carry out their designs in the upbuilding 
and completion of the superstructure. Let us obey their patriotic injunc- 
tions. 

From each of the six original Southern States Ave have introduced the 
most ardent aspirations for liberty— the most positive condemnations of 
slavery. From each of tlie nine slave States which have been admitted 
into the Union since the organization of the General Government, we 
could introduce, from several of their wisest and best citizens, anti- 



80DTHEEN TESTIMONY AGAINST SLAVERY. 113 

slavery sentiments equally as strong and convincing as those that ema- 
nated from the great founders of our movement — Washington, JetFerson, 
Madison, Patrick Henry and the Eandolphs. As we have already 
remarked, however, the limits of this chapter will not admit of the 
introduction of additional testimony from either of the old or new slave 
States. 

The reader will not fail to observe that, in presenting these solid aboli- 
tion doctrines of the South, we have been careful to make such quota- 
tions as triumphantly refute, in every particular, the more specious 
sophistries of the oligarchy. 

The mention of the illustrious names above, reminds us of the fact, 
that many of the party newspapers, whose venal columns are eternally 
teeming with vituperation and slander, have long assured us that the 
Whig ship was to be steered by the Washington rudder, that the Demo- 
cratic bark was to sail with the Jefferson compass, and that the Know- 
Nothing brig was to carry the Madison chart. Imposed upon by these 
monstrous falsehoods, we have, from time to time, been induced to 
engage passage on each of these corrupt and rickety old hulks ; but, in 
every instance, we have been basely swamped in the sea of slavery, and 
are alone indebted for our lives to the kindness of Heaven and the art 
of swimming. Washington the founder of the Whig party ! Jefferson 
the founder of the Democratic party ! Voltaire the founder of Christ- 
ianity ! How absurd ! God forbid that man's heart should always 
continue to be the citadel of deception — that he should ever be to others 
the antipode of what he is to himself. 

There is now in this country but one well-organized party that pro- 
mises, in good faith, to put in practice the principles of Washington, 
Jefferson, Madison, and the other venerable Fathers of the Kepublic — 
the Eepublican party. To this party we pledge unswerving allegiance, 
so long as it shall continue to pursue the statism advocated by the great 
political prototypes above-mentioned, but no longer. We believe it is, 
as it ought to be, the desire, the determination, and the destiny of this 
party, to give the death-blow to slavery ; should future developments 
prove the party at variance Avith this belief — a belief, by the by, whicli 
it has recently inspired in the breasts of little less than one and a half 
million of the most intelligent and patriotic voters in America — we shall 
shake off the dust of our feet against it, and join one that will, in a 
summary manner, extirpate the intolerable grievance. 



CHAPTER IV. 

NOETnERN TESTIMONY. 

Slavery must fall, because it stands in direct hostility to all the grand movements, princi- 
ples, and reforms of our age, because it stands in the way of an advancing world. One great 
idea stands out amidst the discoveries and improvements of modern times. It is, that man is 
not to e.vercise arbitrary, irresponsible power over man. To restrain power, to divide and 
balance it, to create responsibility for its just use, to secure the individual against its abuse, 
to substitute law for private will, to shield the weali from the strong, to give to the injured 
tlie means of redress, to set a fence round every man's property and rights, in a word, to 
secure liberty, — such, under various expressions, is the great object on which philosophers, 
patriots, pliilanthropists, have long fixed their thoughts and hopes. — Cuannino. 

The best evidence that can be given of the enlightened patriotism 
and love of liberty in the free States, is the fact that, at the Presiden- 
tial election in 1S5G, they polled thirteen hundred thousand votes for the 
Reiniblican candidate, Jon:sr 0. Feemont. This fact of itself seems to 
preclude the necessity of strengthening our cause with the individual 
testimony of even their greatest men. Having, however, adduced the 
most cogent and conclusive anti-slavery arguments from the Washing- 
ton.s, the JelFersons, the Madisons, the Randolphs, and the Clays of the 
South, we shall now proceed to enrich our pages with gems of 
Liljerty from the Franklins, the Hamiltons, the Jays, the Adamses, and 
the Websters of the North. Too close attention cannot be paid to the 
words of wisdom which we have extracted from the works of these 
truly eminent and philosopliic statesmen. We will first listen to 

THE VOICE OF FEAXKLIN. 

Dr. Franklin was the first president of " The Pennsylvania Society 
for promoting the Abolition of Slavery ;" and it is now generally con- 
ceded that tliis was the first regularly organized American abolition 
Society — it having been formed as early as 1774, while we were yet sub- 
jects of the British governmetit. In 1790, in the name and on behalf 
of tills Society, Dr. Franklin, who was then within a few months of the 
close of liis life, dratted a memorial "to the Senate and House of Repre- 
sentatives of the United States," in which he said : 

"Your nioinorialists, particularly engaged in attending to tlie distresses arising 
n Din slaycry, l)clieve it to be tliolr indispensable duty to present this subject to 
your notice. Tlicy have olisorveil, with real .satisfaction, thai many important and 
salutary powers are vested in you. t<jr 'promoting the welfare and securing the 
blessings of liberty to the people ol the United States ;' and as they conceive that 
114 



NORTHERN TESTIMONY. 115 

these blessings ougM rightfully to be administered, without distinction of color, to 
all descriptions of people, so they indulge themselves in the pleasing expectation 
that nothing which can be done for the relief of the unhappy' objects of their care, 
will be either omitted or delayed. 

From a persuasion that equal liberty was originally the portion, and is still the 
birthright of all men, and influenced by the strong ties of humanity and the princi- 
ples of their institution, your memorialists conceive themselves bound to use all 
justifiable endeavors to loosen the bonds of slavery, and promote a general enjoy- 
ment of the blessings of freedom. Under these impressions, they earnestly entreat 
your attention to the subject of slavery ; that you will be pleased to countenance 
the restoration to liberty of those unhappy men, who, alone, in this land of free- 
dom, are degraded into perpetual bondage, and who, amid the general joy of sur- 
rounding freemen, are groaning in servile subjection; that yon will devise means 
for removing this inconsistency of character from the American people ; that you 
will promote mercy and justice toward this distressed race ; and that you will .step 
to the very verge of the power vested in you for discouraging every species of traffic 
in the persons of our fellow-men." 

On another occasion, he says : 

" Slavery is an atrocious debasement of human nature." 

THE VOICE OF HAMILTON. 

Alexander Hamilton, the brilliant statesman and financier, tells us 

tliat— 

" The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parch- 
ments or musty records. They are written as with a sunbeam, in the whole vohmie 
of human nature, by the hand of Divinity itself, and can never be erased or ob- 
scured by mortal power." 

Again, in 1774, addressing himself to an ximerican Tory, lie says; 

" The fundamental source of all your errors, sophisms, and false reasonings, is a 
total ignorance of the natural rights of mankind. Were you once to become 
acquainted with these, you could never entertain a thought, that all men are not, 
by nature, entitled to equal privileges. You would be convinced that natural 
liberty is the gift of the beneficent Creator to the whole human race; and that 
civil liberty is founded on that." 

THE TOICE OF JAY. 

John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States under the Constitu- 
tion of 1789, in a letter to the Hon. Elias Boudinot, dated November 17, 
1819, says: 

" Little can be added to what has been said and written on the subject of slavery. 
I concur in the opinion that it ought not to be introduced nor permitted in any of 
the new States, and that it ought'to be gradually diminished and finally abolished 
in all of them. 

•• To me, the constitutional authority of the Congress to prohibit the migration 
and importation of slaves into any of the States, does not appear questionable. 

'• The first article of the Constitution specifies the legislative powers committed 
to the Congress. The 9th section of that article has these words : ' The migration 
or importation of such persons as any of the runoexisting States shall think proper 
to admit, shall not be prohibited by'tlie Congress prior to the year 180S, but a ta.\ 
or duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each 
person.' 

'• I understand the sense and meaning of this clause to be, that the power of the 
Congress, although competent to prohibit such migration and importation, was to 
be exercised with respect to the then existing States, and thorn oidy. until the year 
ISOS, but the Congress were at liberty to nutke such prohibitions as to any nito 
State, which might in the mean time be established. And further, that from and 
after that period, they were authorized to make such prohibitions as to all the 
States, whether new or old. 

" It will, I presume, be admitted, that slaves were the persons intended. Tho 
word slaves was avoided, probably cu account of the existing toleration of slavery, 



116 NORTHERN TESTIMONT. 

and its discordancy with the principles of the Revolution, ttud from a consciousness 
of its being repugnant to the following positions in the Declaration of Independence : 
* We hold these truths to be self-evident : that all men are created equal ; that they 
are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights ; that among these 
are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." 

In a previous letter, -written from Spain, whither he had been 

appointed as minister plenipotentiary, he says, speaking of the abolition 

of slavery : 

" Till America comes into this measure, her prayers to Heaven will be impious. 
This is a strong expression, but it is just. I believe that God governs the world, 
and I believe it to be a maxim in His, as in our courts, that those who ask for 
equity ought to do it." 

WILLI A.M JAY, 

.The Hon. Wm. Jay, a noble son of Chief Justice John Jay, says : 

" A crisis has arrived in which we must maintain our rights, or surrender them 
forever. I speak not to abolitionists alone, but to all who value the liberty our 
fathers achieved. Do you ask what we have to do with slavery ? Let our muzzled 
presses answer — let the mobs excited against us by the merchants and politicians 
answer — let the gag laws threatened by our governors and legislatures answer — 
let the conduct of the National Government answer." 

THE VOICE OF ADAMS. 

From the Diary of John Quincy Adams, "the old man eloquent," we 
make the following extract : 

" It is among the evils of slavery, that it taints the very sources of moral princi- 
ple. It establishes false estimates of virtue and vice ; for what can be more false 
and more heartless than this doctrine, which makes the first and holiest rights of 
humanity to depend upon the color of the skin? It perverts human reason, and 
induces men endowed with logical powers to maintain that slavery is sanctioned 
by the Christian religion ; that slaves are happy and contented in their condition ; 
that between master and slave there are ties of mutual attachment and affection ; 
that the virtues of the master are refined and exalted by the degradation of the 
slave, while at the same time they vent execrations upon the slave trade, curse 
Britain for having given them slaves, burn at the stake negroes convicted of crimes, 
for the terror of the example, and writhe in agonies of fear at the very mention of 
human rights as applicable to men of color." 

THE VOICE OF WEBSTEE. 

In a speech which he delivered at Niblo's Garden, in the city of New 

York, on the 15th of March, 1837, Daniel Webster, the Great Expounder 

of the Constitution, said : 

" On the general question of slavery, a great part of the community is already 
strongly excited. The subject has not only attracted attention as a question of 
politics, but it has struck a far deeper one ahead. It has arrested the religious 
feeling of the country, it has taken strong hold on the consciences of men. He is a 
rash man, indeed, and little conversant with human nature, and especially has he 
au erroneous estimate of the character of the people of this country, who supposes 
that a feeling of this kind is to be trifled with or despised. It will assuredly cause 
itself to be respected. But to endeavor to coin it into silver, or retain its free 
expression, to seek to compress and confine it, warm as it is, and more heated as 
such endeavors would inevitably render it— should this be attempted, I know 
nothing, even in the Constitution or Union itself, which might not be endangered 
by the explosion which might follow." 

When discussing the Oregon Bill in 1848, he said : 

" I have tii.iJo up my mind, for one, that under no circumstances will I consent 
to the further extension of the area of slavery in the United States, or to the fur- 
ther increase of slave representation in the House of Representatives." 



NORTHERN TESTIMONY. 117 

Under date of February 15th. 1850, in a letter to the Rev. Mr. Fur- 

ness, he says : 

" From my earliest youth I have regarded slavery as a great moral and political 
evil. I think it unjust, repugnant to the natural equality of mankind, founded only 
in superior power ; a standing and permanent conquest by the stronger over the 
weaker. All pretence of defending it on the ground of different races, I have ever 
condemned. I have even said that if the black race is weaker, that is a reason 
against, not for, its subjection and oppression. In a religious point of view I have 
ever regarded it, and even spoken of it, not as subject to any express denunciation, 
either in the Old Testament or the New, but as opposed to the whole spirit of the 
Gospel and to the teachings of Jesus Christ. The religion of Jesus Christ is a reli- 
gion of kindness, justice and brotherly love. But slavery is not kindly affectionate : 
it does not seek anothers, and not its own ; it does not let the oppressed go free. 
It is, as I have said, but a continual act of oppression, But then, such is the 
influence of a habit of thinking among men, and such is the influence of what has 
been long established, that even minds, religious and tenderly conscientious, 
such as would be shocked by any single act of oppression, in any single exercise 
of violence and unjust power, are not always moved by the reflection that slavery 
is a continual and permanent violation of human rights." 

While delivering a speech at Buffalo, in the State of New York, in 

the summer of 1851, only about twelve moullis prior to his decease, he 

made use of the following emphatic words : 

•' I never would consent, and never have consented, that there should be one 
foot of slave territory beyond what the old thirteen States had at the formation of 
of the Union. Never, never." 

NOAII WEBSTEE. 

Noah Webster, the great American vocabulist, says : 

" That freedom is the sacred right of every man, whatever be his color, who ha3 
not forfeited it by some violation of municipal law, is a truth established by God 
himself, in the verv creation of human beings. No time, no circumstance, no 
human power or po'licy can change the nature of this truth, nor repeal the funda- 
mental laws of society, by which every man's right to liberty is guarantied. The 
act of enslaving men is always a violation of those great primary laws of society, 
by which alone, the master himself holds every particle of his own freedom." 

THE VOICE OF CLINTON. 

De Witt Clinton, the father of the great system of internal improve- 
ments in the State of New York, speaking of despotism in Europe, aud 
of slavery in America, asks : 

"Have not presrription and precedents-patriarchal dominion—divine right of 
l-intrs and masters, been alternately called in to sanction the slavery of nations? 
\ud would not all the despotisms of the ancient and modern world have van- 
I'-hed into air, if the natural equality of maukiml liad been properly under- 
stood and practised? .... This declares that the same measure of justice 
uuirht to be measured out to all men, without regard to adventitious inequalities, 
and the intellectual and physical disparities which proceed from inexplicable 
causes." 

THE VOICE OF WAREEX. 

Major General Joseph Warren, one of tlie truest patriots of the Revo- 
lution, and the first American officer of rank that fell in our contest with 
Great Britain, says : 

" That personal freedom is the natural right of every man, and that property, 
or an exclusive right to dispose of what he has honestly acquired by his own labor, 
necessarily arises therefrom, are truths that common sense has placed beyond the 



118 NORTHERN TESTIMONY. 

reach of contradiction. And no man, or body of men, can, without being guilty of 
flagrant injustice, claim a right to dispose of the persons or acquisitions of any 
Srman-'orbod'yof men, unless it can be proved that such a right has arisen 
f.-om some compact between the parties, in which it has been explicitly and freely 
granted." 

Otis, Hancock, Ames, and others, should be heard, but for lack of 
apace.' Volumes upon volumes might be filled with extracts similar to 
the above, from the works of the deceased statesmen and sages of the 
North, who, while living, proved themselves equal to the task of exter- 
minating from their own States the matchless curse of human slavery. 
Sucb are the men who, though no longer with us in the flesh, " still 
live." A living principle— an immortal interest— have they, invested in 
every great and good work that distinguishes the free States. The rail- 
roads, the canals, the telegraphs, the factories, the fleets of merchant 
vessels, tlie magnificent cities, the scientific modes of agriculture, the 
unrivalled institutions of learning, and other striking evidences of pro- 
gress and improvement at the North, are, either directly or indirectly, 
the oflspring of their gigantic intellects. When, if ever, commerce, 
and manufactures, and agriculture, and great enterprises, and truth, and 
liberty, and justice, and magnanimity, shall have become obsolete terms, 
then tlieir names may possibly be forgotton, but not till then. 

An army of brave and worthy successors — champions of Freedom 
now living, have the illustrious forefathers of the North, in the persons 
of Garrison, Greeley, Giddings, GoodeD, Grow, and Gerrit Smith ; in 
Seward, Sumner, Stowe, Raymond, Parker, and Phillips ; in Beecher, 
Banks, Burliugarae, Bryant, Hale, and Ilildreth ; in Emerson, Dayton, 
Thompson, Tappan, King and Clieever; in Whittier, Wilson, "Wade, 
Wayland, Weed, and Burleigh. These are the men whom, in connection 
with their learned and eloquent compatriots, the Everetts, the Bancrofts, 
the Prescotts, the Chapins, the LongfeUows, and the Danas, future his- 
torians, if faithful to their calling, will place on record as America's true 
statesmen, literati, preachers, philosophers, and philanthropists, of the 
present age. 

In this connection, however, it may not be amiss to remark that the 
Homers, the Platos, the Bacons, the Newtons, the Shakspeares, the 
Miltons, tlic Blackstones, the Cuviers, the Humboldts, and the Macau- 
lays of America, have not yet been produced ; nor, in our humble judg- 
ment, will they be, until slavery shall have been overthrown, and free- 
dom estalilished in the States of Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee. 
Upon the soil of tliose States, when free, or on other free soil crossed by 
about the same degrees of latitude, and not distant from the Appalachian 
chain of mountains, will, we believe, be nurtured into manhood, in the 
course of one or two centuries, perhaps, as great men as those mentioned 
above— greater, possibly, than any that have over yet lived. Whence 
their ancestors may come, whether from Europe, from Asia, from Africa, 



NORTHERN TESTIMONY. 119 

from Oceanica, from North or South America, or from the islands of the 
sea, or whatever honorable vocation they may now be engaged in, mat- 
ters nothing at all. For aught we know, their great-grandfathers are 
now humble artisans in Maine, or moneyed merchants in Massachusetts ; 
illiterate poor whites in Mississippi, or slave-driving lordlings in South 
Carolina ; frugal farmers in Michigan, or millionaires in Illinois ; daring 
hunters in the Rocky Mountains, or metal-diggers in California ; i)easants 
in France, or princes in Germany — no matter where, or what, the sci)])e 
of country above mentioned is, in our opinion, destined to be the birtli- 
place of their illustrious offspring — the great savans of the New World, 
concerning whom let us console ourselves with the hope that they ai"e 
not buried deeply in the matrix of the future. 



CHAPTER V. 

TESTmONT OF THE NATIOKS. 

Here's Freedom to them that would read, 

Here's Freedom to them that would write, 
There's none ever feared that the truth should be be-UXl, 

But they whom the truth would indict. 
May Liberty meet with success, 

May Prudence protect it from evil, 
May tyrants and tyranny tine in their mist, 

And wander their way to the devil 1 

Burns. 

To the true friends of freedom throughout the world, it is a pleasing 
thought, and one which, hy heing communicated to others, is well cal- 
culated to universalize the principles of liberty, that the great heroes, 
statesmen, and sages, of all ages and nations, ancient and modern, who 
have ever had occasion to speak of the institution of human slavery, 
have entered their most unequivocal aud positive protests against it. 
To say that they disapproved of the system would not be sufficiently 
expressive of the utter detestation with which they nniformly regarded 
it. That they abhorred it as the vilest invention that the Evil One has 
ever assisted bad men to concoct, is quite evident from the very tone 
and construction of their language. 

Having with much pleasure and profit, heard the testimony of America, 
through her representative men, we will now hear that of other nations, 
through their representative men — doubting not that we shall be more 
than remunerated for our time and trouble. We will first listen to 

THE VOICE OF ENGLAND. 

In the case of James Somerset, a negro Avho had been kidnapped in 
Africa, transported to Virginia, there sold into slavery, thence carried 
to England, as a waiting-boy, and there induced to institute proceedings 
against his master for the recovery of his freedom, 

MANSFIELD says : 

" The state of slavery is of such a nature that it is incapable of being introduced 
on any reasons moral or political, but only by positive law, which preserves its 
force long after the reasons, occasion, and time itself whence it was created, are 
erased from the memory. It is so odious that nothing can be sufficient to support 
it but positive law. Whatever inconveniences, therefore, may follow from the 
decision, I cannot say that this case is allowed or approved by the law of England, 
and, therefore, the black must be discharged." 
120 



TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 121 



LOOKE says : 

" Slavery is so vile, so miserable a state of man, and so directly opposite to the 
generous temper and courage of our nation, that it is hard to be convinced that an 
Englishman, much less a gentleman, should plead for it." 

Again, he says : 

" Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every 
man has a property in his own person ; this nobody has a right to but himself." 

lu her speech at the opening of Parliament, on the Sd of February, 

1859, 

QrEEN vicTOEiA Said : 

" I have great satisfaction in announcing to you that the Emperor of the French 
has abolished a system of negro emigration from the coast of Africa, against which, 
as unavoidably tending, however guarded, to the encouragement of the slave trade, 
ray government has never ceased to address to his Imperial Majesty its most earnest 
but friendly representations. Thiswise act on the part of his Imperial Majesty 
induces me to hope that the negotiations now in progress at Paris may tend to the 
total abandonment of the system, and to the substitution of a duly regulated sup- 
ply of free labor." 

PITT says : 

" It is injustice to permit slavery to remain for a single hour." 

FOX says : 

" With regard to a regulation of slavery, my detestation of its existence induces 
me to know no such thing as a regulation of robbery, and a restriction of murder. 
Personal freedom is a right of which he who deprives a fellow-creature is criminal 
in so depriving him, and he who withholds is no less criminal in witlihokling." 

Speaking in Parliament against the slave trade, 

HuDDLESTONE remarked : 

" That a curse attended this trade even in the mode of defending it. By a cer- 
tain fatality, none but the vilest arguments were brought forward, which corrupted 
the very persons who used them. Every one of these was built on the narrow ground 
of interest, of pecuniary profit, of sordid gain, in opposition to every motive that 
had reference to humanity, justice and religion, or to that great principle which 
comprehended them all." 

snAKSPEARE says : 

" A man is master of his liberty." 

\gain, he says : 

" It is the curse of kings to be attended 
By slaves, that take their humors for a warrant 
To break within the bloody house of life. 
And, on the winking of authority, 
To understand a law ; to know the meaning 
Of dangerous majesty, when, perchance, it frowns 
More upon humor than advised respect." 



Again : 
Again : 



" Heaven will one day free us from this slavery." 

Liberty ! Freedom ! Tyranny is dead ! — 
Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the streets ; 
Some to the common pulpits, and cry out. 
Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement." 

6 



122 TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 



cowPEE says: 

" Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs 
Receive our air, that moment they are free. 
They touch our country and their shackles fall. 
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud 
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then, 
And let it circulate through every vein 
Of all your empire, that where Britain's power 
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too." 

MILTON asks: 

" Where is the beauty to see. 
Like the sun-brilliant brow of a nation when free ?" 

Again, he exclaims : 

" execrable son, so to aspire 
Above his brethren, to himself assuming 
Authority usurp'd, from God not given: 
He gave us only over beast, fish, fowl, 
Dominion absolute ; that right we hold 
By his donation ; but man over men 
He made not lord ; such title to himself 
Reserving, human left from human free." 

Again, he says : 

" If our fathers promised for themselves, to make themselves slaves, they could 
make no such promise for us." 

Again : 

" Since, therefore, the law is chiefly right reason, if we are bound to obey a 
magistrate as a minister of God, by the very same reason and the very same law, 
we ought to resist a tyrant, and minister of the devil." 

DR. jonxsoN says : 

" No man is by nature the property of another. The rights of nature must be 
some way forfeited before they can justly be taken away." 

DE. PRICE says : 

" If you have a right to make another man a slave, he has a right to make you a 
slave." 

HARRIET MAETINEATJ SayS : 

"Where a man is allowed the possession of himself, the purchaser of his labor is 
benefited by the vigor of his mind through the service of his limbs: where man is 
made the possession of another, the possessor loses at once and forever all that is 
most valuable in that for which he has paid the price of crime." 

BLA0K8T0NE says : 

"If neither captivity nor contract can, by the plain law of nature and reason, re- 
duce the parent to a state of slavery, much less can they reduce the offspring." 

Again, he says ; 

" The primary aim of society is to protect individuals in the enjoyment of those 
absolute rights which were vested in them by the immutable laws of nature. 
Hence it follows that the first and primary end of human laws is to maintain those 
absolute rights of individuals." 

Again : 

" If any human law shall allow or require us to commit crime, we are bound to 
transgress that human law, or else we must offend both the natural and divine." 



TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 12^ 



COKE says: 

"What the Parliameut doth, shall be holdeu for naught, whenever it shall 
enact that which la contrary to the rights of nature." 

iiAMPDEJ^' says : 

" The essence of all law is justice. What is not justice is not law ; and what in 
not law ought not to be obeyed." 

HARRINGTON says : 

" All men naturally are equal ; forthough nature with a noble variety has made 
different features and lineaments of men, yet as to freedom, she has made every 
one alike, and given them the same desires." 

FORTEsouE says : 

"Those rights which God and nature have established, and which are therefore 
called natural rights, such as life aud liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be 
more effectuallj' invested in every man than they are ; neither do they receive any 
additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolable. On the 
contrarj', no human power has any authority to abridge or destroy them, unless 
the owner himself shall commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture." 

And again : 

" The law, therefore, which supports slavery and opposes liberty, must necessa- 
rily be condemned as cruel, for every feeling of human nature advocates liberty. 
Slavery is introduced by human wickedness, but God advocates liberty, by the 
nature which he has given to man." 

BROUGnAM says : 

" Tell me not of rights — talk not of the property of the planter in his slaves. I 
deny the right ; I acknowledge not the property. In vain you tell me of laws that 
sanction such a claim. There is a law above all the enactments of human codes, 
the same throughout the world, the same in all times; it is the law written by the 
linger of God on the hearts of men ; and by that law, unchangeable and eternal, 
while men despise fraud, aud loathe rapine, and abhor blood, they shall reject with 
iudignatiou the wild and guilty phantasy that man can hold property in man." 

THE VOICE OF IRELAND. 

BURKE says : 

" Slavery is a state so improper, so degrading, and so ruinous to the feelings and 
capacities of human nature, that it ought not to be suffered to exist." 

CURRAX says : 

" I speak in the spirit of British law, which makes liberty commensurate with and 
ii'separable from British soil : which proclaims even to the stranger and the 
s' journer, the moment he steps his foot on British earth, that the ground on which 
he treads is holy and consecrated by the genius of Universal Emancipation. Nc 
r.atter in what language his doom may have been pronounced ; no matter what 
complexion, incompatible with freedom, an Indian or African sun may have burnt 
upon him ; no matter in what disastrous battle his liberty may have been cloven 
down; no matter with what solemnities he may have been devoted upon the altar 
c;f slavery, the moment he touches the sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the god 
sink together in the dust ; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty ; and he stands 
redeemed, regenerated and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of Universal 
Emancipation." 

The Dublin University Magazine for December, 1856, says : 

" The United States must learn, from the example of Rome, that Christianity and 
the pagan institution of slavery cannot coexist together. The Republic must take 
her side and choose her favorite child; for if she love the one, see umst hate the 
other." 



124 TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 



THE VOICE OF SCOTLAND. 

BEATTiE says : 

"Slavery is inconsistent with the dearest and most essential rights of man's na- 
ture ; it is detrimental to virtue and industry ; it hardens the heart to those tender 
sympathies which form the most lovely part of human character ; it mvolves the 
iunocent in hopeless misery, in order to procure wealth and pleasure for the authors 
of that misery; it seeks to degrade into brutes beings whom the Lord of Heaven 
and Earth endowed with rational souls, and created for immortality ; m short, it is 
utterly repugnant to every principle of reason, religion, humanity, and conscience. 
It is impossible for a considerate and unprejudiced mind, to think of slavery with- 
out horror." 

MILLER says : 

" The human mind revolts at a serious discussion of the subject of slavery. 
Every individual, whatever be his country or complexion, is entitled to freedom. ' 

MACKNiGHT says : 

"Men-stealers are inserted among the daring criminals against whom the law of 
God directed its awful curses. These were persons who kidnapped men to sell them 
for slaves ; and this practice seems inseparable from the other iniquities and oppres- 
sions of slavery ; nor can a slave dealer easily keep free from this crimmality, if 
indeed the receiver is as bad as the thief." 

THE VOICE OF FKANCE. 

LAFAYETTE says : 

" I would never have drawn my sword in the cause of America, if I could have 
conceived that thereby I was founding a land of slavery." 

Again, while in the prison of Magdeburg, he says : 

" I know not what disposition has been made of my plantation at Cayenne ; but 
I hope Madame de Lafayette will take care that the negroes who cultivate it shall 
preserve their liberty." 

O. Lafayette, grandson of General Lafayette, in a letter under date 
of April 20th, 1851, says : 

"This great question of the abolition of Negro Slavery, which has my entire 
sympathy, appears to me to have established its importance throughout the world. 
At the present time, the States of the Peninsula, if I do not deceive myself, are the 
only European powers who still continue to possess slaves ; and America, while 
continuing to uphold slavery, feels daily, more and more, how heavily it weighs 
npon her destinies." 

MONTESQUIEU asks : 

" What civil law can restrain a slave from running away, since he is not a mem- 
ber of society?" 

Again, he says : 

" Slavery is contrary to the fundamental principles of all societies." 

Agoin : 

" In democracies, where they are all upon an equality, slavery is contrary to the 
principles of the Constitution." 

Again : 

" Nothing puts one nearer the condition of a brute than always to sec freemen 
and riot be free." 

Again: 

" Even the earth itself, which teems with profusion under the cultivating hand 
of the free born laborer, slirinks in barrenness from the contaminating sweat of a 
slave." 



TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 125 

LOUIS X. issued the following edict : 

" As all men are by nature free born, and as this Kingdom is called the Kingdom 
of Franks (freemen), it shall be so in reality. It is therefore decreed that enfran- 
chisement shall be granted throughout the whole Kingdom upon just and reason- 
able terms." 

BUFFON says : 

" It is apparent that the unfortunate negroes are endowed with excellent hearts, 
and possess the seeds of every human virtue. I cannot write their history without 
lamenting their miserable condition." 

EoussEAU says : 

" The terms slavery and right, contradict and exclude each other." 

BEissoT says : 

" Slavery, in all its forms, in all its degrees, is a violation of divine law, and a 
degradation of human nature." 

THE VOICE OF GERMANY. 

GEOTius says : 

" Those are men-stealers who abduct, keep, sell or buy slaves or freemen. To 
steal a man is the highest kind of theft." 

GOETHE says: 

" Such busy multitudes I fain would see 
Stand upon free soil with a people free." » 

LUTHEB says: 

" Unjust violence is, by no means, the ordinance of God, and therefore can bind 
no one in conscience and right, to obey, whether the command comes from pope, 
emperor, king or master." 

Carl Scliurz, a distinguished German orator, patriot and statesman, 

now a citizen of Wisconsin — a man who was born to reflect honor on 

whatever state or nation in which he may reside — in a most eloquent 

and forcible speech which he delivered in Faneuil Hall, Boston, April 

18, 1859, says : 

" Look at the slave States. There is a class of men who are deprived of their 
natural rights. But this is not the only deplorable feature of that peculiar organ- 
ization of society. Equally deplorable is it, that there is another class of meu who 
keep the former in subjection. That there are slaves is bad ; but almost worse is 
it, that there are masters. Arc not the masters freemen? No, sir! Where is 
their liberty of the press? Where is their liberty of speech? Where is the man 
among them who dares to advocate openly principles not in strict accordance with 
the ruling system? They speak of a Republican form of government, they speak 
of Democracy, but the despotic spirit of slavery and mastership combined per- 
vades their whole political life like a liquid poison. I am an anti-slavery man, and 
I have a right to my opinion in South Carolina just as well as in Massachusetts. 
My neighbor is a Democrat; I maybe sorry for it, but I solemnly acknowledge 
his right to his opinion in Massacliusetts as well as in South Carolina. You tell me, 
that lor my opinion they will mob me in South Carolina. Sir, there is the differ- 
ence between South Carolina aud Massachusetts. There is the difference between 
an anti-slavery man, who is a freeman, and a slaveholder, who is himself a slave." 

Frederick Kapp^ an accomplished German author and orator, who, 
since his arrival in America — many years ago — has paid much atten- 
tion to our social and political institutions, says : 



126 TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 

" The whites who reside in the South, and are non-slaveholders, add very little 
weight to the scale, because they are entirely dependent upon the slaveholders, 
even though these latter constitute no more than perhaps the one-ninth of the 
whole population of the slave States. The non-slaveholders are characterized by 
their povertj' and ignorance ; and we think it a safe calculation to say that not 
more than one-fourth of the whole white population can read and write. It is the 
interest of the slaveholder to perpetuate ignorance. For this reason the free-school 
system of the North has no existence in the South ; the greater the rawness and 
poverty on the part of the whites, the greater is their subordination to, and de- 
pendence on, the slave aristocracy. 

" As a natural consequence growing out of these relations, it is the slaveholder 
only who can obtain public office, or who is elected to Congress; in fact, many of 
the Southern constitutions prescribe such qualifications as being requisite. The 
slaveholders, by these means, transmit from family to family a hereditary influ- 
ence, so that they are no longer merely natural politicians, but have a poUtical 
education, a general political spirit, a very decided political tradition." 

To Dr. Max Langenschwarz, who, in 1833, in connection with his 
friend Ludwig Storch, formed an Anti-Slavery Society in Leipsic, Ger- 
many, we are indebted for the following brief but interesting annals : 

" The first historical documents in regard to the abolition of slavery are to be 
found in Germanj', whose people and governments at a very early period declared 
themselves against Leibeigenschaft (involuntary bondage), and against every right 
to buy or sell human beings, or to keep them as slaves. In a document of the 
fifth century, we hud that the Caiti united with the Franks in a war against the 
Gauls, under the express condition ' That the prisoners should be exchanged, 
that no prisoner should be held or brought into bondage as Leibeigen (a slave,) and 
that capital punishment should avenge such a crime against God and men.' 

" The same feelings are to be found in many other documents of the old Germans. 
In 1372, Henry the Iron, one of the first Landgraves of Hessia, published an edict : 
' Abolishing for all eternity the state of Leibeigenschaft (slavery), and threatening 
with death all those who should be discovered keeping a man, woman or child, in 
involuntary servitude.' 

"In a bishop's edict in 14II {3Iuenster), we find the following : 'If a man is 
kept in involuntary bondage and as a slave against his will, he shall ask for his im- 
mediate deliverance ; and if he is kept a slave in spite of his demand, and defends 
himself against his master, and kills him, the killing (Todtschlag) shall not be con- 
sidered as murder.' " 

THE VOICE OF EUSSIA. 

Those of our readers who keep themselves informed of the grand 
movements and enterprises of the age, need scarcely be reminded that 
the present Czar of Eussia, Alexander II., who is not merely an emperor 
but also a man, and who, by the profound wisdom and magnanimity of 
his measures, bids fair to become a greater Alexander than Alexander 
the Great, has recently issued an elaborate ukase for the purpose of 
bringing about, in due time, the complete abolition of serfdom thrtmsh- 
out his vast empire. In Moscow, at a banquet held on the 9th of Janu- 
ary, 1858, in eclat of the emperor's ukase, and in furtherance of the 
plans proposed for the emancipation of the serfs, M. Bapst, the eminent 
Eussian professor of political economy, said : 

" Wc have met here to celebrate an event which will be an epoch in the annals 
of our history, and upon which future historians will dwell with pleasure. At the 
very commencement of this century, one of our first manufacturers said to Storch, 
that trade could never flourish under our system of compulsory labor or, in other 
words, of serfage ; already, in 1849, the Free Economical Society proved by facts 
tlie inconveniences of serfage as regards agriculture. The development of national 
wealth h.is ever gone hand-in-hand with the regular organization of popnlar labor, 



TESTIMONT OF THE NATIONS. 127 

which, as it gradually emancipates itself from stringent conditions, becomes more 
active, more progressive, and consequently more productive. In proportion as 
national labor gradually issues forth free from such disadvantageous conditions, 
the love of work increases among the people. Emulation and competition arouse 
the sleeping energies of the nation; they will not allow them to rust, and excite 
them to healthy activity and continual progress. The da\- of the primitive forms 
of the economical condition of the people has now left us forever. The wants of 
a great nation increase daily, and cannot be satisfied with the coarse conditions con- 
trary to all progress of primitive economy founded on compulsory labor — a labor the 
limits of which are as restricted as its nature is unproductive. Our task is not to 
double, but to increase tenfold our productive power, our labor, our wealth, unless 
we wish to sec taken away from us by nations more advanced than ourselves the 
markets which are ours by tradition and by our geographical position." 

On the same occasion, M. Pauloft" one of Professor Bapst's most 
wortliy compatriots, said : 

"Heaven has allowed us to live long enough to witness the second regeneration 
of Russia. We may congratulate ourselves, for this movement is one of great 
importance. We breathe more like Christians, our hearts beat more nobly, and 
we may look at the light of heaven with a clearer eye. We have met to-day to 
express our deep and sincere sympathy for a holy and praiseworthy work, and we 
meet without any nervousness to mar our rejoicing. A new spirit animates 
us, a new era has commenced. One of our social conditions is on tlie eve of a 
change. If we consider it in a past light, we may perhaps admit that it was neces- 
sary that it should have been allowed to be as it was from the want of a better 
administrative organization, and of the concentration in the hands of a govern- 
ment of the means which have since given so great a development to the power 
of Russia. But what was momentarily gained to the State was lost to mankind. 
The advantage cost an enormous price. Order without— anarchy within — and the 
condition of the individual cast its shadow over society at large. The emperor has 
struck at the roots of this evil. The glory and prosperity of Russia cannot rest 
upon institutions based on injustice and falsehood. No ! these blessings are hence- 
forth to be found in the path thrown open by him whose name Russia pronounces 
with respect and pride. The emperor has ceded this great reform, which he 
might have accomplished b_v his own powerful will, by asking the nobles to take 
the initiative. Let us then hail this noble idea, inspired by the sole wish for the 
welfare of his people, with that enlightened heartiness which may now be expected 
from Russia. Let us not, however, suppose that the path traced by historj' is an 
avenue of roses without thorns. This would be sheer ignorance. When a new. a 
more moral and Christian state of things is about to bo established, the obstacles 
that will have to be encountered must not be taken into consideration, except withv 
the hope that the torrent of the new life will sweep them away. The change in 
the economical condition of our national existence will arouse our individual ener- 
gies, the want of which is one of our greatest evils. Let us wish, then, gentle- 
men, from our innermost heart, a long life to him who has marshalled his faithful 
Russia to the conquest of truth and justice." 

THE VOICE OF ITALY. 

oiCEKO savs : 

" By the grand laws of nature, all men are born free, and this law is universally 
binding upon all men." 

Again he says : 

" Eternal justice is the basis of all human laws." 

Again : 

"Law is not something wrought out by man's ingenuity, nor is it a decree of the 
people, but it is something eternal, governing the world by the wisdom of its com- 
mands and prohibitions." 

Again : 

" Whatever is just is also the true law, nor can this true law be abrogated by 
any written enactments." 



128 TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 

Again : 

" If there be such a power in the decrees and commands of fools, that the nature 
of things is changed by their votes, why do they not decree that what is bad and 
pernicious shall be regarded as good and wholesome ; or why, if the law can make 
wrong right, can it not make bad good ?" 

Again : 

"Those who have made pernicious and unjust decrees, have made anything 
rather than laws." 

Again : 

" The law of all nations forbids one man to pursue his advantage at the expense 
of another." 

LAOTANTius says : 

" Justice teaches men to know God and to love men, to love and assist one 
another, being all equally the children of God." 

LEO X. says : 

" Not only does the Christian religion, but nature herself cry out against the 
state of slavery." 

THE VOICE OF GEEEOE. 

SOCRATES says : 

" Slavery is a system of outrage and robbery." 

ARISTOTLE says : 

" It is neither for the good, nor is it just, seeing all men are by nature alike, and 
equal, that one should be lord and master over others." 

POLTBITJS says : 

"None but unprincipled and beastly men in society assume the mastery over 
their fellows, as it is among bulls, bears, and cocks." 

PLATO says : 
" Slavery is a system of the most complete injustice." 

From each of the above, and from other nations, additional testimony 
is at hand ; but, for reasons already assigned, we forbear to introduce 
it. Corroborative of the correctness of the position which we have 
assumed, even Persia has a voice, which may be easily recognized in the 
tones of her immortal Cyrus, who says : 

" To fight, in order not to be made a slave, is noble." 

Than Great Britain no nation has more heartily or honorably repented 
of the crime of slavery — no nation, on the perception of its error, has 
ever acted with more prompt magnanimity to its outraged and unhappy 
bondsmen. Entered to her credit, many precious jewels of liberty 
remain in our possession, ready to be delivered when called for ; of their 
value some idea may be formed, when we state that they are filigreed 
with such names as Wilberforce, Buxton, Granville, Grattan, Camden, 
Clarkson, Sharp, Sheridan, Sidney, Martin, and Macaulay. 

Virginia, the Carolinas, and other Southern States, which are pro- 



TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS. 129 

vided, not with republican, but with anti-republican forms of govern- 
ment, and which have abolished freedom, should learn, from the history 
of the monarchical governments of the Old World, if not from the exam- 
ple of the more libei-al and enlightened portions of the New, how to 
abolish slavery. The lesson is before them in a variety of exceedingly 
interesting forms, and, sooner or later, they must learn it, either volun- 
tarily or by compulsion. Yirginia, in particular, is a spoilt child, 
having been the pet of the General Government for the last seventy 
years; and like many other other spoilt children, she has become fro- 
ward, peevish, perverse, sulky and irreverent — not caring to know her 
duties, and failing to perform even those which she does know. Her 
superiors perceive that the abolition of slavery would be a blessing to 
her ; she is, however, either too ignorant to understand the truth, or 
else, as is the more probable, her false pride and obstinacy restrain her 
from acknowledging it. What is to be done ? Shall ignorance, or 
prejudice, or obduracy, or willful meanness, triumph over knowledge, 
and liberality, and guilelessness, and laudable enterprise ? No, never ! 
Assured that Virginia and all the other slaveholding States are doing 
wrong every day, it is our duty to make them do right, if we have the 
power ; and we believe we have the power now resident within their 
own borders. What are the opinions, generally, of the non-slaveholding 
whites ? Let them speak. 



6* 



CHAPTER YI. 

TESTIMONY OF THE CHTJECHES. 

Who blushed alike to be, or have a slave — 

Unchristian thought ! on what pretence soe'er, 

Of right inherited, or else acquired ; 

Of loss, or profit, or what plea you name, 

To buy or sell, to barter, whip, and hold 

In chains a being of celestial make — 

Of kindred form, of kindred faculties, 

Of kindred feelings, passions, thoughts, desires; 

Born free, and heir of an immortal hope ! 

Thought villainous, absurd, detestable ! 

Unworthy to be harbored in a fiend ! 

POLLOK. 

Lo ! the nation is arousing. 

From its slumber, long and deep ; 
And the Church of God is waking, 
Never, never more to sleep. 

While a bondman. 
In his chains remains to weep. 

Oliver Johnsoh. 

In quest of arguments against slavery, we have perused the works of 
several eminent Christian writers of different denominations, and we 
now proceed to lay before the reader the result of a portion of our labor. 
As it is the special object of this chapter to operate on, to correct and 
cleanse the consciences of slaveholding professors of religion, we shall 
adduce testimony only from the five churches to which they, in their 
Satanic piety, mostly belong — the Presbyterian, the Episcopal, the Bap- 
tist, the Methodist, and the Eoman Catholic — all of which, we hope, are 
destined, at no distant day, to become thoroughly imbued with the spirit 
of Heaven-ordained Love and Freedom. With few exceptions, all the 
other Christian sects are, as they should be, avowedly and inflexibly 
opposed to the inhuman institution of slavery. The Congregational, tlie 
Quaker, the Lutheran, the Dutch and German Eeformed, the Unita- 
rian and the Universalist, especially, are all honorable, able, and elo- 
quent defenders of the natural rights of man. We wiU begin by intro- 
ducing a mass of 

PRESBYTEEIAN TESTIMONY. 

The Eev. Albert Barnes, of Philadelphia, one of the most learned 
Presbyterian preachers and commentators of the day, says : 
130 



TESTIMONY OF THE CIIDIiCIIES. 131 

" There is a deep and growing conviction in the minds of the mass of mankind, 
that slavery violates the great laws of our nature ; that it is contrary to the dictates 
of humanity ; tliat it is essentially unjust, oppressive and cruel ; that it invades the 
rights of liljerty with which the Author of om' being has endowed all human beings ; 
and that, in all the forms in which it has ever existed, it has been impossible to 
guard it from what \t< friends and advocates would call ^abuses of the system.' It 
is a vio'atioii of the lirst sentiments expressed in our Declaration of Independence, 
and on which our fathers founded the vindication of their own conduct in an appeal 
to arms. It is at war with all that a man claims for himself and for his own child- 
ren ; and it is opposed to all the struggles of mankind, in all ages, for freedom. 
The claims of humanity plead against it" The struggles for freedom everywhere in 
our world condemn it. The instinctive feeling in every man's own bosom in regard 
to himself is a condemnation of it. The noblest deeds of valor, and of patriotism 
in our own land, and in all lands where men have struggled for freedom, are a con- 
demnation of the system. All that is noble in man is opposed to it ; all that is 
base, oppressive, and cruel, pleads for it. 

" The spirit of the New Testament is against slavery, and the principles of the 
New Testament, if fairly applied, would abolish it. In the New Testament no man 
is commanded to purchase and own a slave ; no man is commended as adding any- 
thing to the evidences of his Christian character, or as performing the appropriate 
duty of a Christian, for owning one. Nowhere in the New Testament is the insti- 
tution referred to as a good one, or as a desirable one. It is commonly — indeed, it 
is almost universally— conceded that the proper application of the principles of the 
New Testament would abolish slavery everjTvhere, or that, the state of things 
which will exist when the Gospel shall be fairly applied to all the relations of life, 
slavery will not be found among those relations. 

" Let slavery be removed from the church, and let the voice of the church, with 
one accord, be lifted up in favor of freedom ; let the church be wholly detached 
from the institution, and let there be adopted by all its ministers and members an 
interpretation of the Bible — as I believe there may be and ought to be— that shall 
be in accordance with the deep-seated principles of our nature in favor of freedom, 
and with our own aspirations for liberty, and with the sentiments of the world in 
\U onward progress in regard to human rights, and not only would a very material 
objection against the Bible be taken away — and one which would be fatal if it were 
well founded— but the establishment of a very strong argument in favor of the Bible, 
as a revelation from God, would be the direct result of such a position." 

Writing " To a certain elder of a certain Presbyterian ClnuTh," of 
which church he himself is a member, 

PROF. 0. D. CLEVELAND SajS : 

" AVIiat, let mo. ask, can tend more to shake the belief of men in the divine inspi- 
ration of the sacred Scriptures, than to endeavor to prove to them, that these same 
Scriptures — the foundation rock of our faith — sanction such a man-brutalizing crime 
as American Slavery? The natural conscience of man, all the world over, revolts 
with loathing at this monstrous crime ; and the law of natioiLs has pronounced the 
slave trade to be pu-acy, condemning to the gallows those found guilty of it ; and a 
sad day will it be for Christianity, if men shall be brought to believe that their 
natural conscience and the laws of nations are higher, in their moral standard, 
than what claims to be the revealed will of God." 

From a resolution denunciatory of slavery, unanimously adopted b\ 
the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, in 1818, we make 
the following extract : 

" We consider the voluntary enslaving of one part of the human race by another 
as a gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights of hura.m nature, as ut- 
terly inconsistent with the law of God, which requires us to love our neighbor as 
ourselves, and as totally irreconcilable with the spirit and principles of the Gospel 
of Christ, which enjoins that ' all things whatsoever ye would that men should do 
to you, do ye even so to them.' . . . We rejoice that the church to which we 
belong commenced, as early as any other in this country, the good work of en- 
deavoring to put an end to slavery, and that in the same work many of its members 
have ever since been, and now are, among the most active, vigorous, and efficient 
laborers. . . . We earnestly exhort them to continue, and, if possible, to in- 
crease, then- exertions to effect a total abolition of slavery." 



132 TESTIMONY OF THE CHURCHES, 

A Committee of the Synod of Kentucky, in an address to the Presby- 
terians of that State, says 

" That our negroes will be worse off, if emancipated, is, we feel, but a specious 
pretext for lulling our own pangs of conscience, and answering the argument of the 

Ehilautliropist. None of us believes that God has so created a whole race that it is 
ettcr for them to remain in perpetual bondage." 

EPISCOPAL TESTIMONY. 

BISHOP noKSLEY says : 

" Slavery is injustice, which no consideration of policy can extenuate." 

BISHOP BUTLEB says : 

" Despicable as the negroes may appear iu our eyes, they arc the creatures of 
God, and of the race of mankind, for whom Christ died, and it is inexcusable to 
keep them in ignorance of the end for which they were made, and of the moans 
whereby they may become partakers of the general redemption." 

BISHOP POETETJS says : 

" The Bible classes men-stealers or slave-traders among the murderers of fathers 
and mothers, and the most profane criminals on earth." 

Thomas Scott, the celebrated Commentator, says : 

" To nimiber the persons of men with beasts, sheep and horses, as the stock of a 
farm, or with bales of goods, as the cargo of a ship, is, no doubt, a most detestable 
and anti-Christian practice." 

John Jay, Esq., of the City of New York — a most exemplary Episco- 
palian — in a pamphlet entitled, " Thoughts on the Duty of the Episcopal 
Church, in Eelation to Slavery," says : 

" Alas! for the expectation that she would conform to the spirit of her ancient 
mother ! She has not merely remained a mute and careless spectator of this great 
conflict of truth and justice with hj'pocrisy and cruelty, but her very priests and 
deacons may be seen ministering at the altar of slavery, offering their talents and 
influence at its unholy shrine, and openly repeating the awful blasphemy, that the 
precepts of our Saviour sanction the system of American slavery. Her Northern 
clergy, with rare exceptions, whatever they may feel on the subject, rebuke it 
neither in public nor in private, and her periodicals, far from advancing the pro- 
gress of abolition, at times oppose our societies, impliedly defending slavery as 
not incompatible with Christianity, and occasionally withholding information use- 
ful to the cause of freedom." 

A writer in a late number of " The Anti-Slavery Churchman," pub- 
lifihed in Geneva, Wisconsin, speaking of a certain portion of the New 
Testament, says : 

" This passage of Paul places necessary work in the hands of Gospel minister" 
If tliey preach the whole Gospel, they must preach what this passage enjoins— and 
if they do tlus, they must preach against American slavery. Its beino- connected 
with politics does not shield them. Political connections cannot place sin under 
protection. They cannot throw around it guards tliat tJie public teachers of morals 
may not pass. Sin is a violation of God's law— and God's law must be proclaimed 
and enforced at all hazards. This is the business of the messenger of God and if 
anything stands in its way, it is his right, rather it his solemn commission, to eo 
forward— straightway to overpass the lines that would shut him out, and utter his 
warnings. Many sins there are, that in like manner, might be shielded. Fashion 
and rank, and busmess, are doing their part to keep much sin in respectability, and 
excuse It from the attacks of God's ministers. But what are these, that they should 
Bedl a mmistcr s lips— what more are the wishes of politicians?" 



TESTIMONY OF THE CHURCHES. 133 

For further tostiraouy from this branch of the Obristiun system, if de- 
sired, we refer the reader to the Kev. Dr. Tyng, the Eev. Evan M. John- 
son, and the Eev. J. McNamara, — all Broad Church Episcopalians, whose 
magic eloquence and irresistible arguments bid fair, at an early day, to 
win over to the paths of progressive freedom, truth, justice and 
humanity, the greater number of their High and Low Church brethren. 

BAPTIST TESTIMONY. 

Concerning a certain text, the Rev. Wm. H. Brisbane, once a slave- 
holding Baptist in South Carolina, says : 

" Paul was speaking of the law having been made for men-stcalers. Where ia 
the record of that law? It is iu Exodus xxi. 16, and in these words: 'He that 
stealeth a man. and selleth him, or if he be found in his possession, he shall surely 
be put to death.' Here it will be perceived that it was a crime to sell the man, for 
which the seller must suffer death. But it was no less a crime to hold him as a 
slave, for this also was punishable with death. A man may be kidnapped out of 
slavery into freedom. There was no law against that. And why? Because kid- 
napping a slave and placing him in a condition of freedom, was only to restore him 
to his lost rights. But if a man who takes him becomes a slaveholder, or a slave 
seller, then he is a criminal, liable to the penalty of death, because he robs the man 
of liberty. Perhaps some will say this law was only applicable to the first holder 
of the slave, that is, the original kidnapper, but not to his successors who might 
have purchased or inherited him. But what is kidnapping? Suppose I propose to 
a neighbor to give him a certain sum of money if he will steal a white child in Caro- 
lina and deliver him to me. He steals him ; I pay him the money upon his deliv- 
ering the child to me. Is it not my act as fully as his ? Am I not also the thief? 
But does it alter the case whether I agree beforehand or not to pay him, for the 
child? He steals him, and then sells him to me. He is found by his parents in my 
hands. Will it avail me to say I purchased him and paid my money for him ? Will 
it not be asked, Do you not know that a white person is not merchantable ? And 
shall I not have to pay the damage for detaining that child in my service as a slave ? 
Assuredly, not only in the eyes of the law, but in the judgment of the whole com- 
munity, 1 would be regarded a criminal. So when one man steals another and offers 
him for sale, no one, in view of the Divine law, can buy him, for the reason tliat 
the Divine law forbids that man shall in the first place be made a merchantable 
article. The inquiry must be, if I buy, I buy in violation of the Divine law, and it 
will not do for me to plead that I bought him. I have him in possession, and that 
is enough, God condemns me for it as a man-stealer. My having him in possession 
is evidence against me, and the Mosaic law says, if he be found in my hands, I must 
die. Now, when Paul said the law was made for men-stealcrs, was it not also say- 
ing the law was made for slaveholders ? I am not intending to apply this term iu a 
harsh spirit. But I am bound, as 1 fear God, to speak what 1 am satisfied is the true 
meaning of the apostle." 

In his " Elements of Moral Science," the Rev. Francis Wayland, D.D., 
one of the most erudite and distinguished Baptists now living, says : 

" The moral precepts of the Bible are diametrically opposed to slavery. They 
are, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, and all things whatsoever ye would that 
men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them. 

" The application of these precepts is universal. Our neighbor is every otie whom 
we may benefit. The obligation respects all things ichatsoever. The precept, thru, 
manifestly, extends to men as men, or men of every condition; and if to all things what- 
soever, certainly to a thing so important as the right to personal liberty. 

" Again. By this precept, it is made our duty to cherish as tender and delicate a 
respect for the right which the meanest individual possesses over the means of hap- 
piness bestowed upon him by God, as we cherish for our own right over our own 
means of happiness, or as we desire any other individual to cherish for it. Now, 
were this precept obeyed, it is manifest that slavery could not in fact exist for a 
single instant. The principle of the precept is absolutely subversive of the princi- 
ple of slavery. That of the one is the entire equality of right ; that of the other, 
tbft entire abs<,rption of the rig^hts of one in the rights of the other. 



134 TESTIMONY OF THE CHURCHES. 

" If any one doubts respecting the bearing of the Scripture precept upon this 
case, afew phiin questions may throw additional light upon the subject. For instance : 

*' Dc the precepts and the spirit of the Gospel allow me to derive my support 
from a system which extorts laborfrom my fellow-men, without allowing them any 
voice in "the equivalent which they shall receive ; and which can only be sustained 
by keeping them in a state of mental degradation, and by shutting them out, in a 
great degree, from the means of salvation : 

" Would the master be willing that another person should subject him to slavery, 
for the same reasons, and on the same grounds that he holds his slaves in bondage? 

" Would the Gospel allow us, if it were in our power, to reduce our fellow-citizens 
of our own color to slavery ? If the Gospel be diametrically opposed to the princi- 
ple of slavery, it must be opposed to the practice of slavery ; and therefore, were 
the principles of the Gospel fully adopted, slavery could not exist. 

" The very course which the Gospel takes on this subject, seems to have been the 
only one that could have been taken, in order to effect the universal abolition of 
slavery. The Gospel was designed, not for one race or for one time, but for all 
races and for all times. It looked not at the abolition of this form of evil for that 
age alone, but for its universal abolition. Hence, the important oV>ject of its Author 
was, to gain it a lodgment in every part of the known world ; so that, by its univer- 
sal diffusion among all classes of society, it might quietly and peacefully modify 
and subdue the evil passions of men; and thus without violence, work a revolution 
in the whole mass of mankind. 

"If the system be wrong, as we have endeavored to show, if it be at variance 
with our duty both to God and to man, it must be abandoned. If it be asked when, 
I ask again when shall a man begin to cease doing wrong? Is not the answer, im- 
mediately? If a man is injuring us, do we ever doubt as to the time when he ought 
to cease ? There is, then, no doubt in respect to tL.e time when we ought to cease 
inflicting injury upon others." 

Abraham Booth, an eminent theological writer of the Baptist persua- 
sion, says : 

"I have not a stronger conviction of scarcely anything, than that slaveholding 
(except where the slave has forfeited his liberty by crimes against society), is 
wicked and incoiLsistent with Christian character. To me it is evident, that who- 
ever would purchase an innocent black man to make him a slave, would with equal 
readiness purchase a white one for the same purpose, could he do it with equal im- 
punity and no more disgrace." 

At a meeting of the General Committee of the Baptists of Virginia, in 

1789, the following resolution w^as offered by Eld. John Leland, and 

adopted : 

^^ Resolved, That slavery is a violent deprivation of the rights of nature, and incon- 
sistent with Republican government, and therefore we recommend it to our breth- 
ren to make use of every measure to extirpate this horrid evil from the land ; and 
pray Almighty God that our honorable legislature may have it in their power to 
proclaim the great jubilee, consistent with the principles of good policy." 

METHODIST TESTIMONY. 

John Wesley, the celebrated founder of Methodism, says : 
" Men buyers are exactly on a level with men stealers." 
Again, he says : 

" American slavery is the vilest that ever saw the sun; it constitutes the sum of 
all villainies." 

The learned Dr. Adam Clarke, author of a voluminous commentary on 
the Scriptures, says : 

"Slave-dealers, whether those who carry on the traffic in human flesh and blooc*, 
or those who steal a person in order to sell him into bondage, or those who buy 
such stolen men or women, no matter of what color or what country ;' or the nations 
who legalize or connive at such traffic ; all these are men-stealers,'and God classes 
them with the most flagitious of mortals." 



TESTIMONY OF THE CHURCHES. 135 

One of the present members of the Black River (New York) Confer- 
ence, a gentleman of fine ability, who is zealous in every good word 

and work, 

PEOF. niRAM MATTisoN', says : 

" The attitude of the American churches in regard to slavery— that parent of every 
other abomination. isnot only strengthening the hands of infidelity againsiChristianity 
in France and England, but in every other nominally Christian country ; and espe- 
cially in these United States. It is sapping the very foundations of all contidence 
in the Christian religion, in the minds of tens of thousands. Not distinguishing 
between the loathsome cancer and the rest of the body— between the counterfeit 
and the genuine — they condemn the whole, and are thenceforth regarded asintidels. 
Instead of a slaveholding religion they accept no religion. And infidelity has no 
more faithful allies in America, than the D.D.'s and otlier ministers who defend, or 
at least apologize for American slavery. They are making more infidels than all 
the infidel books, and periodicals, and lecturers in the land. Let us, then, on this 
account also — its tendency to infidelity — rise up and put away all slaveholding from 
the Church of Christ." 

Again, laying before us a list of the cluirches which are righteously 
active in condemning and opposing slavery, and also of those which arc 
wickedly passive in excusing and upholding it, he says to his brother 
Methodists : 

" Look at our position as a Church in the light of these facts. See in what com- 
pany we place ourselves. Let us range the anti-slavery and pro-slavery Northei'n 
Churches in parallel columns, that our shame may be the more apparent : 

Slave-holding Churches. 
1. Old School Presbyterian. 



2. Protestant Episcopal. 

3. EoMAN Catholic. 

4. Methodist Epis. Church!" 



Anti-Slavery Churches. 

1. Friends, or Qi'AKERS. 

2. Free-will Baptists. 

3. United Brethren. 

4. Associate Presbyterian. 

5. Wesleyan Methodists. 

6. Orthodox Congregational. 

7. General Baptists. 

8. Rep'd Prot. Dutch Chubch. 

9. New School Presbyterian. 

10. Unitarian. 

11. Universalists ! 

One of the rules laid down in the Methodist Discipline as amended iu 

1784, was as follows : 

"Every member of our Society who has slaves in his possession, shall, within 
twelve mouths after notice given to him by the assistant, legally execute and record 
an instrument, whereby he emancipates and sets free every slave in his possession." 

Another rule was in these words : 

" No person holding slaves shall in future be admitted into Society, or to the 
Lord's Supper, till he previously complies with these rules concerning slavery." 

The answer to the question — " What shall be done with those who 

buy or sell slaves, or give them away " — is couched in the following 

language : 

" They are immediately to be expelled, unless they buy them on purpose to free 
them." 

In 1785, the voice of this church was heard as follows : 

"We do hold in the deepest abhorrence the practice of slavery, and shall not 
cease to seek its destruction, by all wise and prudent means." 

In 1797, the Discipline contained the following wholesome paragraph 



136 TESTIMONY OF THE CUUKCHE8. 

" The preachers and other members of our Society are requested to consider the 
subject of Negro slavery, with deep attention, and that they impart to the General 
Conference, through the medium of the Yearly Conferences, or otherwise, any 
important thoughts on the subject, that the Conference may have full light, in 
order to take further steps toward eradicating this enormous evil from that part 
of the Church of God with which they are connected. The annual Conferences arc 
directed to draw up addresses for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, to the 
legislatures of those States in which no general laws have been passed for that pur- 
pose. These addresses shall urge, in the most respectful but pointed manner, the 
necessity of a law for the gradual emancipation of slaves. Proper committees 
shall be appointed by the Annual Conferences, out of the most respectable of our 
friends, for conducting the business ; and presiding elders, elders, deacons, and 
travelling preachers, shall procure as many proper signatures as possible to the 
addresses, and give all the assistance in their power, in every respect, to aid the 
committees, and to forward the blessed undertaking. Let this be continued from 
year to year, till the desired end be accomplished." 

CATHOLIC TESTIMONY. 

It has been only about twenty-two years since Pope Gregory XVI. 
immortalized himself by issuing the famous Bull against slavery, from 
which the following is an extract : 

" Placed as we are on the Supreme seat of the apostles, and acting, though by 
no merits of our own, as the vicegerent of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who, 
through his great mercy, condescended to make himself man, and to die for the 
redemption of the world, we regard as a duty devolving on our pastoral functions, 
that we endeavor to turn aside our faithful flocks entirely from the inhuman traffic 
in negroes, or any other human beings whatever. ... In progress of time, as 
the clouds of heathen superstition became gradually dispersed, circumstances 
reached that point, that during several centuries there were no slaves allowed 
amongst the great majority of the Christian nations ; but with grief we are com- 
pelled to add, that there afterwards arose, even among the faithful, a race of men, 
who, basely blinded by the appetite and desire of sordid lucre, did not hesitate to 
reduce, in remote regions of the earth, Indians, negroes, and other wretched beings, 
to the misery of slavery ; or, finding the trade established and augmented, to assist 
the shameful crime of others. Nor did many of the most glorious of the Eoman 
Pontiffs omit severely to reprove their conduct, as injurious to their soul's health, 
and disgraceful to the Christian name. Among these may be especially quoted the 
bull of Paul III., which bears the date of the 29th of May, 1537, addressed to the 
Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, and another still more comprehensive, by Urban 
VIII., dated the 22d of April, 1636, to the collector Jurius of the Apostolic cham- 
ber in Portugal, most severely castigating by name those who presumed to subject 
either East or West Indians to slavery, to sell, buy. exchange, or give them away, 
to separate them from their wives and children, despoil them of their goods and 
property, to luring or transmit them to other places, or by any means to deprive 
them of liberty, or retain them in slavery ; also most severely castigating those who 
should presume or dare to afford counsel, aid, favor or assistance, under any pre- 
tence, or borrowed color, to those doing the aforesaid ; or should preach or teach 
that it is lawful, or should otherwise presume or dare to cooperate, by any possible 
means, with the aforesaid. . . . Wherefore, we, desiring to divert this disgrace 
from the wliole confines of Christianity, having summoned several of our venerable 
linitliiMs, their Eminences the Cardinals, of the II. R. Church, to our council, and, 
Iiaviii.' maturely deliberated on the whole matter, pursuing the footsteps of our pre- 
decessors, admonished by our apostolical authority, and urgently invoke in the Lord, 
all Chi istians, of whatever condition, that none henceforth dare to subject to slavery, 
unjustly persecute, or despoil of their goods, Indians, negroes, or other classes of 
men, or be accessories to others, or furnish them aid or assistance in so doing ; and 
on no account henceforth to exercise that inhuman traffic by which negroes are 
reduced to slavery, as if they were not men, but automata or chattels, and are sold 
in defiance of all the laws of justice and humanity, and devoted to severe and 
intolerable labors. We further reprobate, by our apostolical authority, all the 
above-described offences as utterly unworthy of the Christian name ; and by the 
same authority we rigidly prohibit and interdict all and every individual, whether 
ecclesiastical or laical, from presuming to defend that commerce in negro slaves 
under pretence or borrowed color, or to teach or publish in any manner, publicly 
or privately, things contrary to the admonitions which we have given in these 
letters. 



TESTIJIONY OF THE CHUKCHES. 13T 

" And, finally, that these, our letters, may be rendered more apparent to all, 
and that no person may allege any ignorance thereof, we decree and order that it 
shall be published according to custom, and copies thereof be properly afljxcd to 
the gates of St. Peter and of the Apostolic Chancel, every and in like manner to 
the General Court of Mount Citatorio, and in the field of the Campus Florse and 
also through the city, by one of our heralds, according to aforesaid custom. 

" Given at Rome, at the Palace of Santa Maria Major, under the seal of the 
fisherman, on the 3d day of December, 1837, and in the ninth year of our pon- 
tificate. 

" Countersigned by Cardinal A. Lambruschini." 

We have already quoted the language of Pope Leo X., who says : 

"Not only does the Christian religion, but nature herself, cry out against the 
state of slavery." 

The Abbo Eayual says : 

" He who supports slavery is the enemy of the human race. He divides it into 
two societies of legal assassins, the oppressors and the oppressed. I shall not be 
afraid to cite to the tribunal of reason and justice those governments which tole- 
rate this cruelty, or which even are not ashamed to make it the basis of their 
power." 

From the proceedings of a Massachusetts Anti-slavery Convention in 

1855, we make the following extract : 

" Henry Kemp, a Roman Catholic, came forward to defend the Romish Church 
in reply to Mr. Foster. He claimed that the Catholic Church is thoroughly anti- 
slavery — as thoroughly as even his friend Foster." 

Thus manfully do men of pure hearts and noble minds, whether in 
Church or State, and without regard to sect or party, lift up their 
voices against the wicked and pernicious system of human slavery. 
Thus they speak, and thus they are obliged to speak, if they speak at 
all ; it is only the voice of Nature, Justice, Truth, and Love, that issues 
from them. The divine principle in man prompts him to speak and 
strike for Freedom ; the diabolical principle within him prompts him to 
speak and strike for slavery. 

From those churches which are now — as all churches ought to be, 
and will be, ere the world becomes Christianized — thoroughly indoctrin- 
ated in the principles of freedom, we do not, as already intimated, deem 
it particularly necessary to bring forward new arguments in opposition 
to slavery. If, however, the reader would be pleased to hear from the 
churches to which we chiefly allude — and, by the by, he might hear 
from them with much profit to himself— we respectfully refer him to 
Henry Ward Beecher, George B. Cheever, Joseph P. Thompson, Tlieo- 
dore Parker, E. H. Chapin, and H. W. Bellows, of the North, and to 
M. D. Conway, John G. Fee, James S. Davis, Daniel Worth, and W. E. 
Lincoln, of the South. All these reverend gentlemen, ministers of dif- 
ferent denominations, feel it their duty to preach against slavery, and, 
to their honor be it said, they do preach against it with unabated zeal 
and success. Our earnest prayer is, that Heaven may enable them, 
their contemporaries and successors, to preach against it with such 
energy and effect, as will cause it, in due time, to disappear forever 
from the soil of our Republic. 



CHAPTER VII. 

BIBLE TESTIMONY. 

Quench, righteous Uod, the thirst, 
That Congo's sons hath curs'd — 

The thirst for gold ! 
Shall not thy thunders speak, 
Where Mammon's altars reek, 
^V'he^e maids and matrons shriek, 

Bound, bleeding, sold ? 

PlERPOKT. 

EvEKT person who has read the Bible, and who has a proper under- 
standing of its leading moral precepts, feels in his own conscience, 
that it is an original and complete anti-slavery book. In a crude state 
of society — in a barbarous age — when men were in a manner destitute 
of wholesome la^js, either human or divine, it is possible that a mild form 
of slavery may have been tolerated, and even regulated, as an insti- 
tution clothed with the importance of temporary recognition ; but the 
Deity never approved it, and for the very reason that it is impossible for 
him to do wrong, he never will, never can approve it. The worst sys- 
tem of servitude of which we have any account in the Bible — and, by 
the way, it furnishes no account of anything so bad as slavery (the evil- 
one and his hot home alone excejjted) — was far less rigorous and atrocious 
than that now established in the Southern States of this Confederacy. 
Even that system, however, the worst, which seems to have been prac- 
tised to a considerable extent by those venerable old fogies, Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob, was one of the monstrous inventions of Satan that 
God " winked " at ; and, to the mind of the biblical scholar, nothing 
can be more evident than that Ho determined of old, that it should, in 
due time, be abolished. To say that the Bible sanctions slavery is 
equivalent to saying that the sun loves darkness ; to say that one man 
was created to domineer over another is to call in question the justice, 
mercy and goodness of God. 

We will now listen to a limited number of the 

PEE0EPT8 AND SAYINGS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

" Proclaim liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof." 

" He that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall 
surely be put to death." 
1S8 



BICLE TESTIMONY. 



139 



"Whoso stoppetli his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry, hut shall 
not be heard." 

"He that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his Maker." 

"Relieve the oppressed." 

" Envy thou not the oppressor, and choose none of his waya." 

"Let the oppressed go free." 

"Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 

" Thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor honor the person of the 
mighty ; but in righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbor." 

" The -wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the 
morning." 

" Do justice to the afflicted and needy ; rid them out of the hand of the wicked." 

" Execute judgment and justice ; take away your exactions from my people, 
Baith the Lord God." 

" Therefore thus saith the Lord ; ye have not hearkened unto me, in proclaiming 
liberty, every one to his brother, and everv man to his neighbor : behold. I pro- 
claim a liberty for you. saith the Lord, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the 
fanune ; and I will make you to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth. 

" I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and 
against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the 
widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear 
not me, saith the Lord of Hosts." 

" As the partridge setteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not ; so he that getteth 
riches, and not by "right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end 
shall be a fool." 

Aud now let us listen to a few selected 

TEECEPTS AJTD SATEStGS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

" Call no man master, neither be ye called masters." 

"Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." 

" If thou mayest be made free, use it rather." 

" Do good to all men, as ye have opportunity." 

" The laborer is worthy of his hire." 

" All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to 
them." 

" Be kindly affectionate one to another with brotherly love ; in honor preferring 
one another." 

" Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free, and be 
not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." 

Some years ago a clerical sycophant of the slave power had the teme- 
rity to publish a book or pamphlet entitled " Bible defence of Slavery," 
which the Baltimore Sun, in the course of a caustic criticism, handled in 
the following manner : 



140 EEBLE TESTIMONY. 

" Bible defence of slavery ! Tliere is no such thing as a Bible defence of slavery 
at the present day. Slavery in the United States is a social institution, originating 
in the convenience and cupidity of our ancestors, existing by State laws, and 
recognized to a certain extent— for the recovery of slave property— by the Consti- 
lution. And nobody would pretend that, if it were inexpedient and unprofitable 
for any man or any State to continue to hold slaves, they would be bound to do so 
on the ground of a ' Bible defence ' of it. Slavery is recorded in the Bible, and ap- 
proved, with many degrading characteristics. War is recorded in the Bible, and 
approved, under what seems to us the extreme of cruelty. But are slavery and 
war to endure for ever because we find them in the Bible ? or are they to cease at 
once and for ever because the Bible inculcates peace and brotherhood?" 

The Haleys, Legrees and Peterkins of the South — boors of Vandalio 
hearts and minds — are, ever and anon, manifesting some of the most 
palpable and ridiculous idiosyncrasies of human nature. Ignorant of 
even the first lessons of a hornbook, they bandy among themselves, in 
traditionary order, certain garbled passages of Scripture, such, for 
instance, as that concerning poor old besotted Noah's intemperate curse 
of Ham, which, in shame and pity be it said, they regard, or pretend to 
regard, as investing them with full and perfect license to practise and 
perpetuate their most unhallowed system of iniquity. Such are the 
hardened, crafty creatures in human form, who, following the example 
of their subtle sire, when he perched himself on a pinnacle of the tem- 
ple at Jerusalem, quote Scripture, without even the semblance of a blush, 
in the prosecution of their treasons, strategems and spoils. Such are 
the veritable actors, who, with "Southside Doctors of Divinity," Bible 
in hand, as prompters, are unceasingly performing the horrible tragedy 
of Human Slavery. From all such gross and irreverent distorters of 
Biblical truth, good Lord deliver us ! 



CHAPTER VIII. 

TESTIMONY OF LIVIXG TFITXESSES. 

It was the intention of the fathers of the Constitution that liberty should be national %ni 
slavery sectional. James Madison, himself a slaveholder, one of the framers of the Constitu- 
tion, afierward Governor of Virginia, and then President of the United States, tells us why 
slavery was not mentioned in that instrument. He said that, when the institution of slavery 
had ceased to exist in this land, they did not wish the memory of it to remain on record. 
.... Shadows of the days that are past gather around me. I am standing as I have 
stood, as a reed shaken by the wind, as the voice of one crying in the wilderness. What ar- 
gument have I not exhausted, to what sentiment have I not appealed ? And I have called 
upon every living thing in vain ; yet when I remember that all the experience of the ages is 
concentrated in our Constitution, I return once more to the charge, and I would that my voice 
could extend to every palace, and to every cabin throughout this wide Republic, that I might 
say to you. Arouse from your fatal delusion ; liberty and slavery cannot coexist ; one or the 
other must die ! — CASSrcs M. Clat. 

The conflict between Freedom and Slavery is not simply a conflict be- 
tween two diverse systems of labor, the one of which recognizes, while 
the other ignores, the manhood of the laborer ; nor merely between two 
diverse policies, the one of which tends to enrich, and the other to im- 
poverish society ; but it is, preeminently, a conflict between civilization 
with aU its elevating and ameliorating influences, on the one side, and 
barbarism with aU its rudeness and savagery, its ignorance and contempt 
of humanity, on the other. The very existence of slavery is incompati- 
ble with the highest order of social life. Fetich- worship does not more 
certainly indicate the degradation of the religious ideas of a peoplo 
than does the chattelization of humanity mark an incomplete civilization. 
This element of barbarism, lingering in society wherever slavery lingers, 
makes itself particularly manifest in the present insane efforts of the 
oligarchy to reopen the foreign slave trade, not only at the expense of 
Immanity and religion, but at the sacrifice of the national honor, and our 
position among the moral forces of the world. 

How strikingly contrasts with this savagery of barbarism the present 
attitude of the great Russian Empire, as represented in the policy of the 
reigning emperor, Alexander the Second! Witli a far-seeing wisdom, 
which takes him out of the mob of vulgar potentates, and vindicates the 
kingship that belongs to a right royal nature, he hae magnanimously re- 
solved on the abolition of serfdom throughout his vast empire. The mag 
nitude of the work proposed, considered, simply in itself, and its still 



142 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

greater magnitude, considered in its far-reaching consequences, are be- 
yond the grasp of any ordinary capacity, and must command for tlie 
young emperor, who has determinedly given himself to it, the sympathy 
and admiration of all true statesmen, pliilanthropists, and friends of free- 
dom throughout the world. His enterprise is a mightier one than that 
which tasked the energies of his renowned ancestor, Peter the Great ; 
and its successful accomplishment will give him a far more legitimate 
and lasting claim on the love and reverence of mankind. The one con- 
solidated a great emjjire, the other will add millions of loyal subjects to 
it, by taking them out of the category of chattels, and giving them then- 
proper status in the ranks of humanity. That this grand project will 
be crowned with success, the wisdom and energy with which the young 
emperor has set himself to the task, forbid us lo doubt. And how it 
shames the despots of our own land, intent not only on the perpetuation 
of their pet barbarism, but on plunging the country into a still deeper 
slough of infamy and peril, by a reopening of tlie African slave trade, 
with all the bloody and sickening atrocities which it involves ! Verily, 
the boasted enlightenment of our slavery propagandists is about on a par 
with that of New Zealand, and may weU challenge the admiration of 
" South-side Doctors of Divinity," who devoutly rcgai-d the kidnapper 
as God's divinest messenger of salvation to the heathen world ! 

But a truce to these thoughts of men and n)easures abroad, and now 
to the contemporaneous Alexanders and others of our own country, be- 
ginning with 

WILLIAM n. SEWAED. 

In his masterly speech at Rochester, on Monday, Oct. 26, 1858, Senator 
Seward said : 

" Free labor and slave labor — ^tliese antagonistic systems are continually comin:^ 
into close contact, and collision results. Shall I tell you what this collision means'? 
They who think it is accidental, unnecessary, the work of interested or fanatical 
agitators, and therefore ephemeral, mistake the case altogether. It is au irrepres- 
sible conflict between opposing and enduring forces, and it means that the United 
States must and will, sooner or later, become either entirely a sluveholding nation, 
or entirely a free-labor nation. Either the cotton and rice fields of South Carolina 
and the sugar plantations of Louisiana will ultimately be tilled by free labor, and 
Charleston and New Orleans become marts for legitimate merchandise alone, ov 
else the rye fields and wheat fields of Massachusetts and New York must again be 
surrendered by their farmers to slave culture and to the production of slaves, and 
Boston and New York become once more markets for trade in the bodies and 
souls of men." 

At Buffalo, Friday, Oct. 19, 1855, he said : 

" I have seen slavery in the slave States, and freedom in the free States. I have 
seen both slavery and freedom in this State. I know too well the evils of the for- 
mer to be willing to spare any effort to prevent their return. The experience of 
New York tells the whole argument against slavery extension, the whole argument 
for universal freedom. Suppose that, fifty years ago, New York, like Virginia and 
Maryland, had clung to slavery, where now would have been these three compo- 
site millions of freemen, the choice and flower of Europe and America? In that 
case, would superstition and false national pride have needed to orcranize a secret 
cabal, afliliated by unlawful oaths, to proscribe the exile and his children for their 
nativity or their conscience' sake ? Where would then have been the Erie Canal, 
the Genesee Valley Canal, the Oswego Canal, the Seneca and Cayuga Canal, the 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 143 

Crooked Lake Canal, the Chemung Canal, the Chenango Canal, the Elack Hirer 
Canal, the Champlain Canal — where the imperial New York Central Eailroad, the 
Erie Eailroad, and the Ogdensburgh Railroad, with their branches penetrating not 
only every inhabited district in this State, but every inhabited region also in adja- 
cent States and in British America? Where would have been the colleges and 
academies, and, above all, the free common schools, yielding instruction to chil- 
dren of all sects and in all languages? Where the asylums and other public char- 
ities, and, above all, that noble emigrant charity which crowns the State with such 
distinguished honor ? Where these ten thousand churches and cathedrals, renew- 
ing on every recurring Sabbath day the marvel of Pentecost, when the sojourner 
from every laud hears the Gospel of Christ preached to him in his own tongue ? 
Where would have been the steamers, the barges, brigs, and schooners, which 
crowd this harbor of Bullalo, bringing hither the productions of the Mississippi 
Valley and of the Gulf coast, in exchange for the fabrics of the Atlantic coast and 
of Europe, and of the teas and spices of Asia ? Where the coasting vessels, the 
merchant ships, the clippers, the whale ships, and the ocean mail steamers, which 
are rapidly concentrating in our great seaport the commerce of the world? AVhere 
the American Navy, at once the representative and champion of the cause of uni- 
versal Kepublicanisni ? Where your inventors of steamboats, of electric telegraphs, 
and of planing machines — where your ingenious artisans — where your artists— 
where your mighty Press, the Coui-ier and Enquirer, the Tribune, the Times, and 
even the Herald itself, defender of slavery as it is ? Where j-our twenty cities — 
and where, above all, the merry, laughing agricultural industry of native-born and 
exotic laborers, enlivening the whole broad landscape, from the Lake coast to the 
Ocean's side ? Go, ask Virginia — go, ask even noble Maryland, expending as she 
is a giant's strength in the serpent's coils, to show you her people, canals, rail- 
roads, universities, schools, charities, commerce, cities, and cultivated acres. Her 
silence is your expressive answer." 

At Albany, Friday, Oct. 12, 1855, he said : 

" So long as the Republican party shall be firm and faithful to the Constitution, 
the Union, and the Rights of Man. I shall serve it, with the reservation of that per- 
sonal independence which is my birthright, but at the same time with the zeal and 
devotion that patriotism allows and enjoins. I do not know, and personallj' I do 
not greatly care, that it shall work out its great ends this year, or the next, or in my 
lifetime ; because I know that those ends are ultimately sure, and that time and 
trial are the elements which make all great reformations sure and lasting. I have 
not thus far lived for personal ends or temporary fame, and I shall not begin so late 
to live or labor for them, 1 have hoped that 1 might leave my country somewhat 
worthier of a lofty destiny, and the rights of human nature somewhat safer. A 
reasonable ambition must always be satisfied with sincere and practical endeavors. 
If, among those who shall come after us, there shall be anj' curious inquirer who 
shall fall upon a name so obscure as mine, he shall be obliged to confess that, 
however unsuccessfully I labored for generous ends, yet that I nevertheless was 
ever faithful, ever hopeful." 

SALMON P. CHASE. 

Addressing the Southern and Western Liberty Convention, at Cin- 
cinnati, June 11, 1845, Mr. Chase used tlie following unreserved, appro- 
priate language : 

'• It is our duty, and our purpose, to rescue the government from the control of 
the slaveholders ; to harmonize its practical administration with the provisions of 
the Constitution, and to secure to all, without exception, and without partiality, 
the rights which the Constitution guarantees. We believe that slaveholding, in the 
United States, is the source of numberless evils, moral, social and political ; that 
it hinders social progress; that it embitters public and private intercourse ; that it 
degrades us as individuals, as States and as a nation : that it holds back our country 
from a splendid career of greatness and glory. We are, therefore, resolutely, 
inflexibly, at all times, and under all circumstances, hostile to its longer continu- 
ance in our land. We believe that its removal can be effected peacefully, con- 
stitutionally, without real injury to any, with the greatest benefit to all. 

" We propose to effect this by repealing all legislation, and discontinuing all action, 
in favor of slavery at home and abroad : by prohibiting the practice of slaveholding iu 
all places of exclusive national jurisdiction, in the District of Columbia, iu American 



144 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

vessels upon the seas, in forts, arsenals, navy yards ; by forbidding the employment 
of slaves upon any public work; by adopting resolutions in Congress, declaring 
that slaveholding, in all States created out of national territories, is unconstitutional, 
and recommending to the others the immediate adoption of measures for its 
extinction within their respective limits ; and by electing and appointing to public 
station such men, and only such men, as openly avow our principles, and will 
honestly carry out our measures." 

OASSrUS M. CLAY. 

Of the great number of good speeches made by members of the Ee- 

publican party during the Presidential campaign of 1856, it is, we 

believe, pretty generally admitted that the best one was made by Mr. 

Clay, of Kentucky, who, at the Tabernacle, in New York city, October 

24th, said: 

"If there are no manufactures, there is no commerce. In vain do the slave- 
holders go to Knoxville, to Nashville, to Memphis and to Charleston, and resolve 
that they will have nothing to do with these Abolition eighteen millions of Northern 
people ; that they will build their own vessels, manufacture their own goods, ship 
their own products to foreign countries and break down New York, Philadelphia 
and Boston ! Again, they resolve and reresolve, and yet there is not a single ton 
more shipped, and not a single article added, to the wealth of the South. But, 
ij^ gentlemen, they never invite such men as I am to attend their conventions. They 
^•"y* know that I would tell them that slavery is the cause of their poverty, and that I 
"**^ will tell them that what they are aiming at is the dissolution of the Union — ^tliat they 
may be prepared to strike for that whenever the nation rises. They well know 
that by slave labor the very propositions which they make can never be realized; 
yet, when we show these things, they cry out, ' Oh, Cotton is King !' But when 
we look at the statistics, we find that so far from Cotton being King, Grass is King. 
There are nine articles of staple productions which are larger than that of cotton 
in this country. 
■"- " I suppose it does not follow, because slavery is endeavoring to modify the great 

dicta of our fathers, that cotton and free labor are incompatible. In the extreme 
South, at New Orleans, the laboring men — the stevedores and hackmen on the 
levee, where the heat is intensified by the proximity of the red brick buildings — are 
all white men, and they are in the full enjoyment of health. But how about 
cotton? I am informed by a friend of mine — himself a slaveholder, and therefore 
good authority — that in Northwestern Texas, among the German settlements, who, 
true to their national instincts, will not employ the labor of a slave, they produce 
more cotton to the acre, and of a better quality, and selling at prices from a cent 
to a cent and a half a pound higher than that produced by slave labor. This is an 
experiment that illustrates what I have always held, that whatever is right is 
expedient." 

JOHN CHARLES FREMONT. 

Accepting his nomination for the Presidency, in 1856, Mr. Fremont, 
one of the noblest sons of the South, said : 

" I heartily concur in all movements which have for their object the repair of the 
mischiefs arising from the violation of good faith in the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise. 1 am opposed to slavery in the abstract, and upon principles sus- 
tained and made habitual by long-settled convictions. I am inflexibly opposed to its 
extension on this continent beyond its present limits. 

" The great body of non-slaveholding freemen, including those of the South, 
upon whose welfare slavery is an oppression, will discover that the power of the 
general government over the public lands may be beneficially exerted to advance 
their interests and secure their independence ; knowing this, their suffrages will 
not be wanting to maintain that authority in the Union, which is absolutely 
essential to the maintenance of their own liberties, and which has more than onco 
indicated the jiurpose of disposing of the public lands in such a way as would 
make every selUer upon them a freeholder." 



TESTIMONT OF LIYENG WITNESSES. 145 

CHAELES SUilXER. 

Speaking of the Crime atcainst Kansas, in the United States Sen- 
ate, on the 19th and 20th of May, 1856, Mr. Sumner, the scholarly and 
eloquent statesman — a gentleman and patriot, of -whom it is not too 
much to say, there is not an ungenerous hair upon his head, nor an iota 
of discount in his composition — a prudent, fearless advocate of free 
labor, whom, ever since Brooks' dastardly assault upon him, on tlie 
22d of May, 1856, \re, as a Carolinian, have been eager (but have not 
yet had the opportunity) to grasp by the hand, and give from the South 
assurances of at least one hearty, unqualified condemnation of the out- 
rage — said: 

" The TTickedncss which I now begin to expose is immeasurably aggravated by 
the motive which prompted it. Not in anj' common lust for power did this un- 
common tragedy have its origin. It is the rape of a virgin Territory, compelling 
it to the hateful embrace of slavery ; and it may be clearly traced to a depraved 
longing for a new slave State, the hideous offspring of such a crime, in the hope of 
adding to the power of slavery in the national government. Yes, sir, when the 
whole world, alike Christian and Turk, is rising up to condemn this wrong, and to 
make it a hissing to the nations, here in our republic, force — aye, sir, force — has 
been openly cmploj-ed in compelling Kansas to this pollution, and all for the sake 
of political power. There is the simple fact, which you will vainly attempt to deny, 
but which in itself presents an essential wickedness that makes other public crimes 
seem like public virtues In just regard for free labor in that Terri- 
tory, which it is sought to blast by unwelcome association with slave labor ; ia 
Christian sympathy with the slave, whom it is proposed to task and to sell there ; in 
stern condemnation of the crime which has been consummated on that beautiful 
soil ; in rescue of fellow-citizens, now subjugated to a tyrannical usurpation ; in 
dutiful respect for the earh' Fathers, whose aspirations arc now ignobly thwarted ; 
in the name of the Constitution, which has been outraged — of the laws, trampled 
down — or Justice banished — of Humanity degraded — of Peace destroyed — of Free- 
dom crushed to earth : and, in the name of the Heavenly Father, whose service is 
perfect freedom, I make this last appeal." 

UEXEY WILSON. 

Replying to Mr. Hammond, of South Carolina, in the United States 
Senate, March 20th, 1858, Gen. Wilson of Massachusetts, said : 

" Fealty to the Administration, to the Democratic party, is now fealty to human 
slavery, to violence, to trickery, and to fraud. By perversions of the Constitution 
and the laws, by the red hand of violence, bj- unveiled trickeries and transparent 
frauds, by the indecent proscription of men of inflexible integrity, by the sliame- 
less prostitution of the honors of the government, and by the 'rank corruption, 
mining all within,' which 'infects unseen,' the administration is converting the 
American Democracy into a mere organization for the perpetuity, expansion, and 
domination of human slavery on the North American continent. There is not to- 
day, in all Christendom, a political organization so hostile to the rights of human 
nature, to the development of republican ideas, to the general progress of the 
human race, as the Democratic party of the United States. There is not a political 
organization even in Spain, Russia, or Austria, that dares, in the face of the civil- 
ized world, blazon its banners with doctrines so hostile to the rights of mankind, 
so abhorrent to humanity, as are avowed in these halls, and upheld by the Ameri- 
can Democracy, under the lead of this administration. The great powers of 
liurope. Eiigluiid, France and Russia, have fixed their hungry eyes upon the cov- 
eted prizes ef the Eastern World ; and we are invoked to forget the lessons of 
Was-Jimgton, to close our ears to the appeals of the people of Kansas, whose rights 
have been ouiraj^ed, and turn our lustful eyes to the glittering prizes of dominion 

7 • 



146 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

in Mexico, Central America, Cuba, and Jlie valleys of the distant Amazon. No 
party in tliosc three European monarchies dares avow, in the face of Christendom, 
the sentiment we have heard proclaimed in these halls, that territorial expansion, 
and territorial dominion must be made, not for the advancement of tlie sacred and 
sublime principle of equal and impartial liberty to all men, but for tlie suVijugation 
and personal ser\itude of other and inferior races 1 tell the vaunt- 
ing senator from South Carolina that thousands of merchants, manufacturers and 
mechanics of the North are this daj', and have been for moutjis, pressed with the 
burden of bearing the unpaid debts owed«thera by the slave States. 1 remember 
that during the terrible pressure of last year, while our business men were stagger- 
ing under the pressure, thirteen out of fourteen wholesale merchants in one depart- 
ment of business in one Southern city, imposed upon their Eastern creditors the 
burden of renewing their matured notes. The merchants and manufacturers of 
the North have lost hundreds of millions of dollars during the last tliirtj' years in 
the slave States. I have personally lost, in the senator's own State, in Louisiana, 
Virginia, and Kentucky, thousands of dollars more than I am now able to com- 
mand." 

JOUS. P. HALE. 

In Lis speecli on Kansas and the Supreme Court, delivered in the 
United States Senate, January 21st, 1Sj8, Mr. Hale said: 

" Peace came in 1783 ; and in 1784 Thomas Jefferson, the immortal author of the 
immortal Declaration of Independence, began his labors in the Continental Con- 
gress, moving that all the territory we then ovrned, and all the territory- that we 
might thereafter acquire, should be forever free from what he considered the con- 
taminating and blighting influences of human slavery. Those v, ho are laboring 
with me in this great contest may take courage from the pcr-'^everancc with which 
Jefferson adhered to his policy. In 17S3-'84:-'85, and '86, the measm-e failed, but 
finally, in 1787. it partially succeeded, and the ordinance was passed prohibiting 
slavery from all the territory which we then owned. Yet, sir, in view of all this 
history, written as with a sunbeam upon the verj^ walls of the room in Vv-hich this 
tribunal now assemble, they stand up in 1S57, to declare to the world that the 
slave trade and slavery were so universally recognized and acknov.ledged, that 
nobody questioned the rightfulness of the traflSc, and nobody supposed it capable 
of being questioned. Not content with overturning the whole line of judicial 
authority to be found in every nation of Europe, and in every State of this Union, 
and of their own solemn recorded decision, they go on to make the avowal ; and 
then go further, and undertake to tear from that chaplet which adorns the brov,-s 
of the men of the Revolution the proudest and fairest of their ornaments; and that 
was the sincerity of the professions which they made in regard to the rights of 
human nature. It is true, the court in their charity undertake to throw the laautle 
of ignorance over these men, and say they did not understand what they meant. Sir, 
they did understand it, and the country understood it. There was a jealousy on the 
subject of liberty and slavery at that time, of which we are little prepared to judge 
at the present day. It is found beaming out on the pages of the writings of ;id 
these men. 

" If the opinions of the Supreme Court are true, they put these men in the worst 
position of any men who are to be found on the pages of our history. If ihe 
opinion of theSuprcme Court be true, it makes the immortal authors cf the De- 
claration of Independence liars before God and hypocrites before the world ; !or 
they lay down their sentiments broad, full, and explicit, and then they say lla; 
they appeal to the Supreme Ruler of the universe for the rectitude of their ir.ten- 
tions ; but if you believe the Supreme Court, they were merely quibbling on wonis. 
They went into the courts of the Most High and pledged lidelity to their princ'j Its 
as the price they would pay for success ; and now it is attempted to cheat them out 
of the poor boon of integrity ; and it is said that tliey did not mean so : and that 
when they said all men, they meant all white men : and when they said that the contest 
they waged was for the right of mankind, the Supreme Court of the United Stales 
would have you believe they meant it was to establish slavevj-. Against tliat I pro- 
test, here, now, and everywhere; and I tell the Supreme Court that these, things 
are so impregnably fixed in the hearts of the people, on the page of history, in the 
recollections and traditions of men, that it v,ill require mightier efforts than they 
have made or can make to overturn or to shake these settled convictions of the 
popular understanding and of the popular heart." 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 147 

NATHANIEL P. BANKS. 

In tlie course of liis great speecli in Wall street, Nev\- York, ou the 
25tli of Sept., 1S5G, Mr. Banks said : 

" For seventy-five years past tke government of this country has been iu the 
lian^ls of southern statesmen, who have directed its policy. The North has been 
busy in the mechanical arts, iu agriculture, and in mining, and has given less atten- 
tion to the affairs of the governnient than it otherviise might have done — certainly 
less than it ought to have done. Ou the contrary, the South having no literature 
of its own, having uo science of its own, having no mechanical and luauufacturiug 
industry of its own, having but little or uo inventive power or genius of its ovv^n, 
liaving, iu short, none of the elements of power that distinguish our civilization, 
has turned its attention chiefly, so far as Its leading men are concerned, to the 
government of the country. Now, we of the North propose to divide this little 

matter with them I should do wrong to our cause — the cause of 

the Northern Stales — if I failed to say that there are other influences we desire to 
exert by the elevation to the Presidency' of the man of our choice. We ask that 
the dead weight of human wrong shall be lilted up from the continent again, that 
it may rise as it was rising before these acts of wrong were done." 

EDWIN D. MORGAN. 

After calling to order the Convention wliicli, in Philadelphia, in June, 
1856, nominated Mr. Fremont for President, and Mr. Dayton for Vice- 
President, Mr. Morgan, as Chairman of the Republican National Com- 
mittee — now Governor of 'Kew York — said : 

" You are assembled for patriotic purposes. High expectations are cherished 
by the people. You are here to-day to give direction to a movement which is to 
decide whether the people of the United States are to be hereafter and forever 
chained to the present national policy of the extension of Human Slavery. Not 
whether the South is to rule, or the North ; but whether the broad, national policy 
which our fathers established, cherished and maintained, is to be permitted to 
descend to their sons, to be the guiding star of all our people. Such is the maijni- 
tude of the question submitted. In its consideration let us avoid all extremes — 
plant ourselves firmly ou the platfoim of the Constitution and the Union, taking 
no position which does not commend itself to the judgment of our consciences, 
our country, and of mankind. Of the wisdom of such a policy there ueed be no 
doubt : against it, there can be no successful resistance." 

EDWARD WADE. 

In his speech on the Slavery question, in the Ilouse of Represen- 
tatives, August 2, 1856, Mr. Wade said : 

"Inherent and fundamental right of freedom of speech and the press, docs not 
and cannot exist in slaveholding communities. This is a necessity of despotic 
governments, it is more than a necessity of despotism, it is in itself, the essence of 
despotism. There is not a more morbidly suspicious, cruel, revengeful, or lawless 
despotism on the face of the earth, than the nightmare of slavery, which has 
settled down upon the people of the slaveholding States, with the"exception of 
perhaps two or three of these States. There is more freedom of speech and of 
the press to-day, and more personal safety hi the exercise of such freedom, at 
Vienna, St. Petersburg, Paris, or Rome, in an attack and exposure of the despot- 
ism which reigns supreme over those cities, than there is at Richmond, Charleston, 
Milledgeville, or Mobile, to attack and expose the slaveholding despotisms which 
rule over these cities with a rod of iron. There are probably more citizens, born 
and nurtured in the slave States, now in exile from their native States for the exer- 
cise of freedom of speech and the press, against the dcsjiotism of slavelioldmg. 
than there are from Au-tria. Russia, France, or the Two Sicilies, for the exfrci'so 
of the same rights against the despotisms which crush those nations." 



148 l-ESTEtfOKY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

fea:jvC13 p. blaie, sen. 

In the course of an address to the Republieaus of Mar\-land — his 

own State — in 1856, Mr. Blair said: 

" In ever}' aspect in -wliich slavery among us can be considered, it is pregnant 
witli difliculty. Its continuance in the States in which it has talien root has resulted 
in the monopoly of the soil, to a great extent, in the hands of the slaveholders, 
and the entire control of all departments of the State Government; and yet a 
ni:ijority of people in the slave States are not slaveowner. This produces an 
anomaly in the principle of our free institutions, which threatens in time to brmg 
into subjugation to slaveowners the great body of the free white population." 

FEAXK P. BLAIR, JE. 

In his speech at Ooucoid, K"ew Hampshire, February 2, 1859, Mr. 

Blair, of Missouri, of whom the non-slavoholders of the South have high 

hopes in the future, said : 

" There is no other question before the country than that of slavery. It la the 
all-absorbing topic in every political circle. Upon this issue Ihave long since taken 
ray ground against its extension and j)erpetuation. I believe that slavery should 
be restricted to its present limits, and that Congress sliould do all which lies in its 
power to prevent the perpetuation of this evil. I know that Congress has no power 
to interfere with it where it at present exists within the States ; and yet I doubt not 
that when the Republican party takes possession of the general government, and 
the corrupting patronage of the administration is diverted from its present channels, 
we shall be able to >how the little oligarchy of slave-holders some things of which 
they little dream even within the States. . . . Although the institution of slavery is 
to be c ondemned, because it deprives the slave of every tiling except his bread and but- 
ter, and clothing, and shelter in winter, it merits more decided condemnation on ano- 
ther ground. It deprives the poor whites of the South ofevery aspiration which apper- 
tains to anything nobler than their liodies. It deprives them of the exercise of tlieir 
intellects, of schools, education and culture, no less than of the bread of themselves 
and their children. I am more opposed to the institution on this ground than on 
any other, because it is our own race, the white race, which is here trampled upon 
— a race of working men and mechanics like yourselves. Slavery is the most odious 
institution ever known. It is essentially and vitally aristocratic. How dare these 
men stand up here and call themselves Democrats, while they have a race of whites 
pressed down under a twofold stratum of slaves and slave owners. I appeal to the 
people of New Humii^hire to lend a helping hand to this ojipressedrace. Toward 
them the friends of s'avery intrench themselves iu exclusive ri^-hts of a twofold 
nature. The negro slave is instructed in all the mechanical arts for the benefit of 
his master, and the white non-slaveholder is thus excluded from all opportunities 
lor elevating Jiis family or providing for their wants." 

GEEHITT SMITH. 

In his speech on the ^Nebraska bill, delivered in the House of Ee- 
presentatives, April 6, 1854, Mr. Smith said : 

" The slavery question is up again — up again even in Congress! It will not be 
kept down. At no bidding, however authoritative, will it keep down The Presi- 
dent of the Uniteil States commands it to keep down. Indeed he has, hitherto, 
seemed to make the keeping down of this question the great end of his great ofKce. 
Members of Congress have so far humbled themselves, as to pledge themselves on 
this floor to keep it down. National political conventions promise to discounte- 
nance, and even to resist the agitation of slavery, both in and out of Congress. 
Commerce and politics are as afraid of this agitation, as Macbeth was of the ghost 
of Banquo ; and many titled divines, taking their cue from coininerce and politics, 
and being no less servile than merchants and demagogues, do what they can to 
keep the slavery qnesl"ion out of sight. Biit all is of no avail. The saucy slavery 
question will not mind them. To repress it in one quarter, is only to have it burst 
forth more prominently in anothi>r quarter. If you hold it back here, it will breik 
loose there, and ru.-h forward with an accu!uulatej force, that shall amply revenge 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 14:9 

for all its detention. And tliis is not strange, -when we consider liow great is the 
power of truth. It were madness for man to bid the grass not to grow, the waters 
not to run. tlie winds not to blow. It were madness for him to assimie the mastery 
of the eloments of the physical world. But more emphatically were it madness for 
him to attempt to hold in his puny fist the forces of the moral world. Canute's 
folly, in setting bounds to the sea. "was wisdom itself, compiired wilh the so mnch 
greater folly of attempting to subjugate the moral forces. Now, the power which 
is, ever and anon, throwing up the slavery question into our unwilling and affrighted 
faces, is Truth. The passion-blinded and the infatuated may not discern this mighty 
agent. Nevertheless, Truth lives and reigns forever; and she will be, continually, 
tossing lip unsettled questions. We must bear in mind, too, that every question, 
which has not been disposed of in conformity with her requirements, and which 
has not been laid to repose on her own blessed bosom, is an unsettled question. 
Hence, slavery is an unsettled question, and must continue such, until it shall have 
fled forever from the presence of liberty." 

JOSHUA R. GIDDIXGS. 

In his speech on American Piracy, in Co^nmittee of the whole 

House, on the state of the Union, June 7, 1858, Mr. Giddings said : 

"Every man who sells a slave thereby encourages the slave trade ; and no reflect- 
ing mind can regard the coastwise slave trade less criminal than that which is car- 
ried on upon the shores of Africa. In truth it was born of the African trade, and 
in its effects it is more atrocious, as its victims are more intelligent. It is thus tliat 
the African slave trade, the coastwise slave trade, the inter-State slave trade, the 
holding of slaves, the breeding of slaves, the selling and buying of slaves, are all 
connected and interwoven in one general network of moral turpitude, constituting an 
excrescence, a cancer upon the body politic of our nation. The African slave trade 
constitutes the germ, the root, from which our American slave trade, and all the 
various relations of that institution in this country, have sprung. If the tree be 
piracy, it is clear that its fruit can be nothing else than piracy : and when the 
nation stamped that commerce as piratical, it proclaimed the guilt of every man 
who voluntarily connects himself with slavery." 

AXSO:^ BUELINGASIE. 

In his defence of Massachusetts, in the House of Eepresentatives, 

June 21, 185G, Mr. Burlingame said: 

" Freedom and slavery started together in the great race on this continent. In 
the very year the Pilgrim Fathers landed on Plymouth Rock, slaves landed in Vir- 
ginia. Freedom has gone on trampling down barbarism, and planting States- 
building the symbols of its faith bvevcry lake, and every river, until now the sous 
ofthe pilgrims stand by the shores of the Pacific. Slavery has also made its way 
toward the setting sun. It has reached the Rio Grande on the South : and the 
groans of its victims, and the clank of its chains, may be heard as it slowly ascends 
the western tributaries of the Mississippi River. Freedom has left the land bespangled 
with free schools, and filled the whole heavens with the shining towers of religion 
and civilization. Slavery has left desolation, ignorance, and death, in its path. 
When we look at these things ; when we see what the country would have been had 
freedom been given to the territories ; when we think what it would have been but 
for this blight in the bosom of the country; that the whole South— tliat ftiir land 
God has blessed so much— would have been covered with cities, and villages, and 
railroads, and that in the country, in the place of twenty-five millions of people, 
thirtv-flve millions would have hai'lcd the rising morn, exulting in republican liberty 
—when we think of these things, how must every honest man— how must every 
man with brains in his head, or heart in his bosom— regret that the policy of old 
Virginia, in her better days, did not become the animatingpolicy of this expanding 
Republic !" 

GALTTSHA A. GROW. 

In his speed I against the Lecoinpton Constitution, delivered in the 

House of Kepresentatives, March 25, 1858, Mr. Grow said : 

" Peace among a brave people is not the fruit of injustice, nor does agitation 
cease by the perpetration of wrong. For a thu-d of a century, the advocates of 



150 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

slavery, wliile exercisin;? unrestricted speech in its defence, liave struggled to pre- 
vent all discu.ssion agaiiist it — in the South, by penal statutes, mob law, and brute 
force ; in the North, by dispersing assemblages of peaceable citizens, pelting their 
lecturers, burning their halls, and destroying their presses ; in this forum of the 
people, by finality resolves on all laws for the benefit of slavery, not, however, to 
affect those in behalf of freedom, and by attempts to stifle the great constitutional 
riiiht of the people at all times to petition their government. Yet. despite threats, 
mob law, and linality resolves, the discussion goes on, and will continue to, so long 
as right and wrong, justice and injustice, humanity and inhumanity, shall struggle 
for supremacy in the affairs of men." 

EALPir TVALDO EMEESOJT. 

In his speech at Concord, Massachusetts, Aug. 1, 18-M, celehrating the 
anniversary of the abolition of slavery in the West Indies, Mr. Emerson, 
the most i^ractical and profound metaphysician in America, said : 

" The crude element of good in human affairs must work andripen, spite of ■whips, 
and plantation laws, and West Indian interests. Conscience rolled on its pillow, 
and could not sleep. V/e sympathize very tenderly here with the poor aggrieved 
planter, of whom so many unpleasant things are said : but if we saw the whip applied 
to old men, to tender women ; and, undeniably, though I shrink to say so, — pregnant 
women set in the treadmill for refusing to work, when, not they, but the eternal law 
of animal nature refused to work ; — if we saw men's backs flayed with cowhides, 
and ' liot rum poured on, superinduced with brine or pickle, rubbed in with a corn- 
husk, in the scorcliing heat of the sun ;' — if we saw the runaways hunted with 
blood-hounds into swamps and hills; and, incases of passion, a planter throwing his 
negro into a copper of boiling cane juice, — if we saw these things with eyes, we too 
should wince. They are not pleasant sights. The blood is moral : the blood is 
anti-slavery : it runs cold in the veins : the stomach rises with disgust, and cm-ses 
slavery 

•• Unhappily, most unhappily, gentlemen, man is born with intellect, as well as 
with a love of sugar, and with a sense of justice, as well as a taste for strong drink. 
These ripened, as well as those. You could not educate him, you could not get any 
poetry, any wisdom, any beauty in woman, any strong and comraandinii- character 
in man, ))ut these absurdities would still come "flashing out.— these absurdities of a 
demand for justice, a generosity for the weak and oppressed. Unhappily, too, for 
the planter, the laws of nature are in harmony with each other : that which the head 
and the heart demand, is found to be. in the long run. for what the grossest cal- 
culator calls his advantage. The moral sense is always supported by the permanent 
iiiterest of the parties. Else, 1 know not how, in our world, any good would ever 
get done. It was shown to the jjlanters that they, as well as the nef^rops, were 
slaves ; that though they paid no wages, they got verv poor work ; that their estates 
were ruinmg them under the finest climate ; and that Ihev needed the severest 
monopoly laws at home to keep them from batdcruptev. The oppression of the 
slave recoiled on them. They were full of vices; their children were Inmps of 
pride, slotli, sensuality and rottenness. The position of woman was nearly as bad 
as it could he, and, like other robbers, they could not sleep in securitv. Many 
planters have said, since the emancipation, that, before that day, they' were the 
greatest slaves on the estate. Slavery is no scholar, no improver ;" it does notlove 
the whistle of the railroad; it docs not love the newspaper, the mail ba^, a col- 
lege, abook, ora preacherwlio has the absurd whim ofsaying whathe thinks^ it does 
not increase the white population ; it does not improve the soil ; evervthin"- "-ocs 
to decay." ° " 

THOMAS COEWIX. 

In liis speech against the Compromise Bill, delivered in the United 
State-s Senate, July 24, 1848, Mr. Corwin, once a Kentucky boy, now a:i 
Ohio man, said : 

•'I am the more confirmed in the course which I am determined to pursue, bv 
some historical facts elicited in this very discussion. I remeni),er what was said 
\y[''V«"^tor from Virginia the other day. It is a truth, that when the Constitution 
ot the United States was made. South Carolina and Georgia refuse.l to come into the 
Union unless the slave trade should be continued for twenty years ; and the North 
agreed that tliey would vote to continue tlie slave trade for twenty years ; yes, 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 151 

voted that this new Republic should engage in piracy and murder at the will of t\yo 
States ! So the history reads ; and the condition of the agreement was, that those 
two States should agree to some arrangement about navigation laws' I do not 
blame South Carolina and Georgia for this transaction any more than I do those 
Northern States who shared in it. But suppose the question were now presented here 
by any one, whether we should adopt the foreign slave trade and continue it for 
twenty years, would not the whole land turn pale with horror, that, in the middle 
of the nineteenth century, a citizen of a free community, a senator of the United 
States, should dare to propose the adoption of a system that has been denommated 
piracy and murder, and is bv law punished by death all over Christendom ? What 
did they do then? They had the power to prohibit it: but. at the command of 
these two States, they allowed that to be introduced into the Constitution, to which 
much of slavery now existing in our land is clearly to be traced. For who can 
doubt that, but for that woeful bargain, slavery would by this time have disappeared 
from all the States then in the Union, with one or two exceptions ? The number 
of slaves in the United States at this period was about six hundred thousand ; it is 
now three millions. And just as you extend the area of slavery, so you multiply 
the difficulties which lie in the way of its extermination. It had been infinitely 
better that day that South Carolina and Georgia had remained out of the Union for 
a while, rather than that the Constitution should have been made to sanction the 
slave trade for twenty years. The dissolution of the old Confederation would have 
been nothing in comparison with that recognition of piracy and murder. I can 
conceive of nothing in the dark record of man's enormities, from the death of Abel 
down to this hour, so horrible as that of stealing people from their own home, and 
making them and their posterity slaves forever. It is a crime which we know has 
been visited with such signal punishment in the history of nations as to_ warrant the 
belief that heaven itself had interfered to avenge the wrongs of earth." 

B. GEATZ BROWW. 

In the ilissoiiri legislature, in January, 1857, Mr. Brown, of St. 

Louis, proved himself a hero, a patriot and a statesman, in the following 

words : 

"I am a Free-Soiler, and I don't deny it. No word or vote of mine shall ever 
inure to the benefit of such a monstrous doctrine as the extension of slavery over 
the patrimony of the free white laborers of the country. I am for the greatest 
good of the greatest number, and against the system which monopolizes the free 
and fertile territory of our country for a few slaveholders, to the exclusion ot thou- 
sands upon thousands of the sinewy sons of toil. The time will come, and perhaps 
very soon, when the people will rule for their own benefit, and not for that of a 
class which, numerically speaking, is insignificant. I stand here in the midst of the 
assembled legislature of Missouri to avow myself a Free-Soiler. Let those who 
are scared at names shrink from the position if they will. I shall take my stand in 
favor of the white man. Here, in Missouri, I shall support the rights, the dignity 
and the welfare of the eight hundred thousand non-slaveholders m preference to 
upholding and perpetuating the domiaancy of the thirty thousand slaveholders 
who inhabit our State." 

IIEXET C. CAEEY. 

In liis statesman-like Letters to the President, which Mr. Buchanan, 
to whom they are mo.st respectfully addressed, has not answered, for 
the reason, we suppose, that it is ahsolutely impossible fur him to 
answer them with any credit to himself or to his party, Mr. Carey says, 
assuring us tliat ten years ago conservative, patriotic men everywhere, 
would have regarded as a false prophet the man who had predicted : 

" That, at the close of a single decade, tlie regular expenditures of the federal 
government, in a time of peace, would reach seventy millions of dollars— beipg five 
times more than they had been but thirty years before. , i , ., ■ 

" That the Executive would dictate to members of Congress what should be their 
course, and publicly advertise the offices that were to be given, to those whose votes 
should be in accordance with his desires. tit 

" That the growing mental slavery thus indicated, would be attended by o pf- 



152 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

responding growth in the belief, that 'one of the chief bulwarks of our institutions' 
was to be found in the physical enslavement of the laborer. 

" That the extension of the area of human slavery would have become the pri- 
mary object of the government, and that, with that view, the great Ordinance of 
1787, as carried out in the Missouri Compromise, would be repealed. 

" That the reopening of the slave trade would be publicly advocated, and that 
tlie lirst step toward its accomplishment would be taken by a citizen of the 
United States— in rescinding all the prohibitions of the Central American govern- 
ments. 

" Tliat the prohibition of slavery in a Central American State would be con- 
sidered sutHcient reason for the rejection of a treaty. 

" Tluit the substitution, throughout all the minor employments of society, of slave 
luDor for that of the freeman, would be publicly recommended by the Executive of 
a leading State. 

" That, wliile always seeking territory in the South, the rights and interests of the 
people would be bartered away, for tlie sole and exclusive purpose of preventing 
annexation in the North. 

" That Lyuch-law would have found its way into the Senate chamber: that it 
would Iiave superseded the provisions of the Constitution throughout the Southern 
States : that it would have superseded the civil authority, in one of the States of 
the Union : that the right of the States to prohibit slavery within their limits, 
would be so seriously questioned as to warrant the belief, that the day wa^near 
at hand when it would be totally denied : that all the decisions of the Supreme 
Court for sixty years, favorable to freedom, would by this time have been 
reversed : that the doctrine of constructive treason would be adopted in federal 
courts : and that the rights of the citizen would be thus in equal peril, from the 
extension of legal authority on one hand, and the substitution of the law of force 
on the other. 

" That polygamy and slavery Avould go hand in hand with each other, and that 
the doctrine of a plurality of wives would be publicly proclaimed by men holding 
. highly important offices under the Federal government." 

WENDELL PHILLIPS. 

In liis speech at the City Ilall, in Worcester, Mass., Jan. 15, 1857, 
Mr. Phillips, the Demosthenes of New England, whom certain Pro- 
Slavery fanatics of the South, in an insane effort to abuse, have highly com- 
plimented by describing him as " an infernal machine set to music," said : 

" Slavery is so momentous an evil, that in its presence all others pale away. No 
thoughtful man can deem any sacrifice too great to secure its abolition. The safety 
of the people is the highest law. In this battle we demand a clear field and the 
u:-e of every honorable weapon. Even the monuments of our fathers are no longer 
sacred, if the enemy are concealed behind them. 

" This is my first claim upon every man who has an Anti-Slavery purpose. One 
of the greatest, if not the greatest question of the age, is that of Free Labor. 1 
do not know — no man can prophecy — what sacrifices it will demand, no human 
sagacity divine wliat shape it will acquire in the kaleidoscope of the future. Nobody 
can foresee the combinations that will be necessary in order to secure libertj' and 
turn law into justice. The pledge we make to each other, as Abolitionists, is, that 
to this slave question, embodying as it does the higliest justice and the most per- 
fect liberty, synonymous as it is with right, manhood, justice, with pure religion, 
a. free press, an impartial judiciary and a true civilization, we will sacrifice every- 
thing. If any man dissents, he is not, in any just sense, an Abolitionist. If he has 
not studied the question enough to know that it binds up in itself all considerations 
of government, then he is not worthy of being called an Abolitionist." 

Again, on the 17th of February, 1859, addressing a Committee of the 
Massachusetts legislature, in support of numerous petitions, asking for 
a law to prevent the recapture of fugitive slaves, he said : 

"It is no answer to my request to say, that youwill granta jury trial— that you will 
licdge the citizen with such safeguards that none but a real fugitive can ever be de- 
livered up. That is not the Massachusetts we want, and not the Massachusetts we have 
a right to claim. If the South has violated the Constitution repeatedly, palpably. 



TESTIMO^n' OF LIVING WITNESSES. 153 

avowedly, defiantly, atrociously, for lier own purposes — to get power in the govern- 
ment, to perpetuate her system, to control the nation — we claim of you that you 
should exercise the privilege which that violation has giveii you. We claim of you 
that you should give us a Massachusetts worthy of its ancient name. Give us a 
State that is not disgraced by the trial, in the nineteenth century, in the midst of so- 
called Christian chiu'ches, of the issue, ' Is this man a chattel"?' We v/ill not rest 
until it is decided as the law of Massachusetts, that a human being, immortal, 
created by the hand of God, shall not be put upon trial in the Commonwealth, and 
required to prove that he is not property. It shall not be competent for the courts 
of Massachusetts to insult the civilization of the nineteenth century by asking that 
question, or making it the subject of evidence and proof." 

THEODOEE PARKER. 

lu liis discourse at the Music Hall, in Boston, on Monday, February 

12, 1854, Mr. Parker, who, bountifully supplied with brain, was bo^-n 

thinking, and whose abhorrence of slavery of the body is more than 

equalled by his abhorrence of slavery of the mind, said : 

" Slavery hinders the education and the industry of the people; it is fatal to 
their piety. Think of a religious kidnapper I a Christian Slave-breeder ! a Slave- 
trader loving his neighbor as hnnself, receiving the 'sacraments' in some Protes- 
tant Church from tlie hand of a Christian apostle, thcii the next day selling babies 
by the dozen, and tearing young women from the arms of their husbands, to feed 
the lust of lecherous New Orleans ! Imagine a religious man selling his own child- 
ren into eternal bondage ! Think of a Christian defending slavery out of the 
Bible and declaring there is no higher law, but Atheism is the first principle of 

Republican government As soon as the North awakes to its 

ideas, and uses its vast strength of money, its vast strength of numbers, and its 
still more gigantic strength of educated intellect, We shall tread this monster under- 
neath our feet. See how Spain has fallen— how poor and miserable is Spanish 
America. She stands there a perpetual warning to us. One day the North will 
rise in her majesty, and put Slavery under our feet, and then we shall extend the 
area of freedom. The blessing of Almighty God will come down upon the noblest 
people the world ever .saw — who have triumphed over Theocracy, Monarchy, 
Aristocracy, Despotocracy, and have got a Democracy— a government of all, for 
all, and by all — a ehurch without a bishop, a state without a king, a community 
without a lord, and a family without a slave." 

WILLIAM LLOTD GARKISOM. 

In a recently published volume of his Writings and Speeches, Mr. 
Garrison, under whose most able counsel and convincing arguments 
organized opposition to slavery first became an important, and is des- 
tined soon to become a controlling, power in the government, says : 

" It is the strength and glory of the Anti-Slavery cause, that its principles are so 
simple and elementary, and yet so vital to freedom, morality and religion, as to 
commend themselves to the understandings and consciences of men of every sect 
and party, every creed and persuasion, every caste and color. They are self- 
evident truths — fixed stars in the moral firmament — blazing suns in the great uni- 
verse of mind, dispensing light and heat over the whole surfiice of humanity, and 
around which all social and moral affinities revolve in harmony. They are to be 
denied, only as the existence of a God, or the immortality of the soul, is denied. 
Unlike human theories, they can never lead astray ; unlike human devices, 

they can never be made subservient to ambition or selfishness I 

will say, finally, that I tremble for the republic while slavery exists therein. If I 
look up to God for success, no smile of mercy or forgivene-s dispels the gloom of 
futurity; if to our resources, they are daily diminishing; if to all history, our 
destruction is not only possible, but almost certain. Why should wo slumber at 
this momentous crisis? If our hearts were dead to every throb of humanity ; if it 
Were lawful to oppress, where power is ample; still, if we had any ro'rard for our 
safety and happiness, we should strive to crush the vampire which is feeding upon 
our life blood. All the selfishness of our nature cries aloud for a l)etter security. 
Our own vices are too strong for us, and keep us in perpetual alarm ; how in 

17* 



154 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

addition to tlicse, shall wc be able to contend successfully with millions of armed 
and dosi)crate men, as we must eventually, if slavery do not cease ?" 

HEXET "WARD BEECHEE. 

la liis addresis boforo the American Tract Society of Boston, in the 

Church of the Puritans, New York, May 12, 1859, Mr. Beecher said: 

" For more than thirty years the diapason of this country has not been the swell 
of the ocean. It has not been the sighina: of the wind through our Western 
forests ; tlie deep thunder-toned diapason tliat has rolled through this land, has been 
the sighing of the slave. Throughout all this time the Church has heard the voice, 
and scarcely knew what it was. But God has been rolling it upon her more and 
more. In my day a conflict has taken place. I remember the days of mobs. I 
remember when IBiruey's press v/as broken in pieces at Cincinnati and dragged 
into the Ohio Eiver. I remember when Theodore Weld was driven by unvitalized 
eggs from jjlacc to place in the West. I ren>ember the day when storehouses were 
sacked and lumses pillaged in New York. I remember the day when a venerable 
man escaped from being murdered for a good cause, and because he escaped has 
never been engaged in it since. I remember when it was as much as a man's name 
was wortli to be called an Abolitionist. I have within twenty 3-ears seen those 
parties which were the most tj^rannic ground out of existence, and those churches 
which refused to discuss this question have been overrun by it and taken complete 
possession of. Synods, which have acted as dykes, have been overwhelmed and 
submerged. General Assemblies h'ave been carried away captive by this good 
cause, and the public sentiment of the whole continent has been changed in this 
mighty work." 

GEOKGE B. CHEEVER. 

In an address delivered in the Church of the Puritans, on Thursday, 
May 13, 1858, Dr. Cheever, speaking of the sin of slavery, said : 

" We practise the iniquity upon children, innocent children, the natives of our 
own land, unbought, unsold, unpaid for, without consultation or consent of father 
or mother, or the shadow of a permission from the Almighty ; and they, the new- 
born babes of this system, are the compoimd interest year by year added to the 
sin and its ca])itat, which thus doubles upon us in the next generation, and must 
treble in another. We make use of the most sacred domestic affections, of mater- 
nal, filial, and I was going to say, connubial love — but the system forbids, and I 
have to say coniubimal — for such rapid and accumulating production of the iniquity, 
as shall be in some measure adequate to the demand. The whole family relation, 
the whole domestic state, is prostituted, poisoned, turned into a misery-making 
machine for the agent of all evil. What God meant should be the source and inspi- 
ration of happiuei-s, becomes the fountain of sin and woe. The sacred names of 
husband, wile, father, mother, son, babe, become the exponents of various forces 
and values in the slave-breeding institute. And the whole perfection, comi)lete- 
ne.ss and concentration of this creative power in this manufacturing interest de- 
scends like a trip-liammer on the children, beating them from birth into market- 
able articles, and stamping and sealing them as chattels, foredoomed and fatalized to 
run till they wear out, as living spindles, wheels, activities of labor and product- 
iveness, in the same horrible system. 

" And each generation of immortal marketable stuff is as exactly fashioned in 
these grooves, molds, channels, wefted, netted and drawn through, to come out the 
invariable product, as the yards of carpeting are cut from the loomtobe trodden on, 
or as the coins drop from the die for the circulation of societj'. This is the pecu- 
liarity of the sin of slavery in the foremost Christian country on the face of the earth. 
In this branch of native industry and manufacture we are self-reliant. Disavowing 
a protective policy in almost everything else, we are proudly patriotic for the 
security, superiority and abundance of this most sacred native product of domestic 
raanufucture, and for neither the raw material nor the bleaching of it will depend 
on any other country in the world." 

J08f;PII P. THOMPSON. 

Trying the Fugitive Slave Law by the Old and New Testaments, Dr. 
Thompson, pastor of the Broadway Tabernacle, says : 



TKSTIMONY OF LIVIXG WITNPISSES. 155 

"Whatever may be thought of the lawfu'ness or the expediency of introducing 
the gen ral subject of slavery into the pulpit, there can be no question that the 
treatment due to fugitives from slavery is a legitimate topic for discussion there. 
That is a suiijoct of which the Bible treats, and in making it a subject of discourse I 
am not jireatiin,^' politics but am preaching the Gospel; applying the principles of 
the Bible to an important public interest. The subject legitimately belongs to the 
pulp't. am! politicians should be careful how they tamper with it, lest they betray 
an ):;norance of the principles of Biblical interpretation and of the spirit of Christi- 
anity, as groi-s as that ignorance of political affairs which tliey are prone to charge 
upon ministers of the Gospel. The treatment of fugitive slaves has indeed been 
made a political cjuestion ; but it was a Biblical question and a question of morality 
long 1)1 fore it was dragged into the arena of politics, and it was legislated upon by 
the King of heaven and earth ages before the Congress of the United States had an 

existence The laws of Moses were given in the wilderness, to a 

people just escaped from bondage, and who therefore had no slaves ; they were 
given in anticipation of the introduction of slavery among that people when they 
should come to be settled as conquerors in Canaan ; they were given to restrain the 
lust of conquest and oppression, and to hedge in as much as possible the natural 
tendency of the emancipated to retaliate upon others the cruelties of their own 
bondage — to prevent the Israelites from becoming to each other and to the Ca- 
naanites what the Egyptians had been to the Israelites : the_y were given in order, 
by a qualified and an onerous permission, to secure the overthrow of a system 
which, a- ilie times and the people were, could not have been shut out by an abso- 
lute prohibition. And as the crowning act of legislation for the ultimate overthro'^ 
of an evil tolerated from necessity, it was decreed that no fugitive from slavery 
should ever be delivered up to his master. The slave was at liberty to escape from 
his master whenever he desired to better his condition, and in whatever part of 
Israel he should choose an asylum, there was he to be allowed to remain without 
molestation." 

E. II. CHAPIN. 

From two of Mr. Chapiu's published works, cue entitled " True Man- 
liness," the other "City Life," we make the following extracts: 

" I pass into the anti-slavery meeting. Here, I discover, is agitated a great truth 
— the natural e(iuality of all nien — the right of the poorest and lowest to be free, to 
breathe God's air upon what hill-top he will, to follow his sunslune around the 
earth if he list — the wrong of holding him in bondage, of putting him by force to do 

another's work Intemperance, slavery, war, what are these but 

the flowering plants of interior sin? Activity and intelligence in- 
dicate a condition of material and individual freedom. A community which really 
llirives in all the departments of its industry, must be, essentially, a free community. 
Despotism prevails more where men do liot feel that they have much at stake in 
the countrv, and where their faculties have not been aroused. But the toil of en- 
terprise and the sense of j'ossei-sion, develop a consciousness of personality which 
resists encroachment and chafes under oppression." 

HENP^T W. BELLOWS. 

Writing to his friend, the Eev. Thos. W. Higginson, under date of 

Jan. 6, 18.57, Dr. Bellows says : 

The last election has shown that the North is waking up in conscience, courage, 
and sensibiltv to her duty, not to herself alone, but to the Nation, the Union, au'l 
Humanitv. The astonishing effect of the free press in arousing the people, indicates 
v,liat wi,! be the triumph of another election. The South sees for the first time that 
tli.> North is in earnest, feels its ]iower. and is determining to exercise it. And this 
is having an admirable effect upon the discussion of the subject. W hat I desire now 
and alw'avs to maintain is this : That our conscientious opposition to the extension 
of slaverV is not to be abated or colored by fears for the Union ; and that, so tar 
as it depends on the North, we are to stop its extension, let the consequences to 
the Union— to the North or the South— be what they will. This ground I believe 
to be the safe ground— the Christian, humane, patriotic, constitutional, imsec'tional, 
Union-saving ground. 1 take it as a lover of the North and a lover of the South ; 
»s a believer in the future of the United States. I take it as a hater of slavery, an 
undying foe to its extension, and a laborer for its overthrow and extinction in tht 
speediest manner and time consistent with our whole duty as American citizens. 



15G TESTIMONY OK LIVING "WITNESSES. 

LEWIS TAPPA.N. 

In his thirteenth annual Report to the American and Foreign Anti- 
Slavery Society, Mr. Tappan says : 

" Nature cries alovid against the inliumanities of slavery; Free Democracy ab- 
jures tlie liatelul system ; and fj-ee Christianity recoils from its leprous toucli. That 
itshoukl exist, extend, and flourish in a nation planted by the excellent of the earth, 
and in opposition to the principles of republicanism and Christianity, excites the 
marvel and arouses the grief and indignation of good men throughout the world. 

American slavery is at war with the Declaration of Independence, 

the Constitution of the United States, natural justice, and Christianity. Agitation 
on the subject will not, therefore, cease while free discussion is allowed, while a free 
press exists, wh'le Protestantism and Free Democracy are prized, while love to 
God and man prevail, until the curse is removed from the Church and Government 

of this country, and all its citizens are equal before the law It is 

obvious to every intelligent and candid looker-on, that the anti-slavery cause, in 
spite of the sneers of opponents, the denunciations of men in power, and the designs 
of the crafty, is steadily pursuing its march to a glorious consummation." 

JOSriUA LEAVITT. 

In the course of an elaborate article on national politics, Dr. Leavitt, 
one of the able editors of the Independent — a New York weekly reli- 
gious newspaper — says : 

" The ascendency of the slave power in the councils of the nation, obtained 
through the ill-advised concessions of the federal constitution, and strengthened 
by a fong series of usurpations on the one hand, and of surrenders on the other, is 
unjust, dangerous to tlie Union, and incompatible with the preservation of free go- 
vernment; and is the principal cause of the political and hnancial evils under which 
we groan; and thus the only hope of relief is in a united determination of the friends 
of fi-cedom, to employ all wi.KJ and lawful means for the extinction of slavery itself." 

WILLIAM 600DELL. 

In his careful ami C()mi)rehensi\'e "View of the Slavery Question," Mr. 

Goodell says : 

" The inherent criminality of slavery and of slave holding, their utter repugnance 
to natm-al justice, to Christianity, to the law of nature, to the law of God, to the prin- 
ciples of democracy, to the liberties of the country— no longer present questions 
for serious discussion among the great body of intelligent citizens in the non-slave- 
holding States. Here and there a superanuated ecclesiastic (who has, perhaps, a 
sou at the South, or in a college seeking Southern patronage) may thumb over his 
Polyglot, and pretend to find a juslilication of slavery. But nobody believes him. 
His disclaimers and self-contradictions prove that he does not, even in his dotage, 
believe it himself. ...... Under the good providence of God, the dissen- 
sions among abolitionists, however humiliating to them, and however mischievous 
in some respects, have been over-ruled in other respects for good. Abolitionism, 
before the division, was a powerful elixir, in the phial of one anti-slavery organiza- 
tion, corked up tight, and carried about for exhibition. By the division, the phial 
was broken and the contents spilled over the whole surface of society, where it has 
been working as a leaven, ever since, till the mass is beginning to upheave." 

SAMUEL J. MAY. 

In his speech at Syracuse, Xew York, Oct. 14, 1851, Mr. .\[ay said : 

"To urge that our Eepublic cannot be maintained, but upon principles diametri- 
cally opposite to those upon whicli it was so solemnly based, is as much as to pro^ 
claim to the world that our Declarationof Independence is found to be untrue ; and 
thus rejoice the hearts of tyrants throughout the world, and cast down forever the 

hopes of the oppressed everywhere. Never have the principles 

on which the civil institutions of our country were founded been put to so severe 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSEg. 157 

a test, as at tliis dav. The encroaclimeiits of the despotic power oi a slavehold- 
ing oligarchy upou'that liberty which our fathers thought they had bequeathed us, 
have beeu made to such an extent, that the champious of that oligarchy have, on 
the floor of our national Congress, pronounced the glorious declaration of '70, that 
all men have an inalienable right to liberty — a mere rhetorical flourish — and have 
dared to intimate that the poor and laboring people of the Northern States, ought 
not to be allowed to exercise the prerogatives of freemen, any more than the 
Southern slaves. And by the machinery of partyism, the leaders of the northern 
wings of the two political hosts, have been brought to acquiesce in the supremacy 
of the slaveholding power in our country, and to unite in requiring of us all, im- 
plicit obedience to its demands, though they violate, utterly, our highest sense of 
right, and outrage every feeling of humanity." 

WILLIAM CULLEN BETANT. 

In his paper of Oct. 2Ttli, 1858, Mr. Bryant, the venerable bard and 
unbending patriot, who has so long and so ahly presided over the edi- 
torial columns of the New York Evening Post, says ; 

" By instigations to violence and threats of mob-law, the free expression of 
opinion in regard to slavery is put down in the Southern States. Freedom of 
speech in a community seems to depend on the recognition of personal freedom in 
all classes. Wherever slavery is introduced, a despotic oligarchy is created, which 

allows of no more liberty of speech than is permitted in Austria 

The slaveholding aristocracy is the most cowardly of all aristocracies. It hves in 
constant fear of overthrow ; it knows that it has a bad name ; that the opinion of 
the world is against it, and, as those are apt to do who are conscious of standing 
in general discredit, it puts on a bold face and plays the bully where it has the 
opportunity, and the ruffian where it has the power." 

nORACE GREELEY. 

For the purpose of showing that Mr. Greeley is not, as he is generally 
represented by the oligarchy, an inveterate hater of the South; we 
introduce the following extracts from one of his editorial articles in a 
late number of the New York Tribune— & most faithful and efficient 
advocate of Free Labor, the circulation of which we are happy to be able 
to state, is greater than the aggregate circulation of a score or more of 
the principal pro-slavery sheets published south of the Potomac : 

" Is it in vain that we pile fact upon fact, proof on proof, showing that slavery 
is a bli<rht and a curse to the States which cherish it? These facts are multitudin- 
ous as°the leaves of the forest ; conclusive as the demonstrations of geometry. 
Nobody attempts to refute them, but the champions of slavery extension seem 
deterniined to persist in ignoring them. Let it be understood, then, once for all, 
that we do not hate the South, war on the South, nor seek to ruin the South, in 
resisting the extension of slavery. We most earnestly believe human bondage a 
curse t(T the South, and to all whom it affects ; but we do not labor for its overthrow 
olherwise than through the conviction of the South of its injustice and mischief. 
Us extension into new territories we determinedly resist, not by any means from 
iil will to the South, but under the impulse of good will to all mankind. 

•' Whenever we draw a parallel between Northern and Southern production, 
industry, thrift, wealth, the few who seek to parry the facts at all complain that 
the instances are unfairly selected— that the commercial ascendency of the ^orth. 
with the profils and facilities thence accruing, accounts for the striking preponder- 
ance of the North. In vain we insist that slavery is the cause of this very com- 
mercial ascendency— that Norfolk and Richmond and Charleston might have been 
to this country whkt Boston, New York and Philadelphia now are, had not slavery 
spread its pall over and paralyzed the energies of the South." 

HEXEY J. EATMOjrD. 

In his paper of Sept. 3, 1856, Mr. Eaymond, the enterprising and 
accomplished editor of the New York Daily Times, says : 



158 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES, 

" Here at the North everything is so free— men think and speak, and write and 
print, and teach so freely what they believe to be trne, that it is hard to realize 
the actual tyranny wliich slavery has established over our Southern brethren. 
How thoroughly it rules all political action, we know from incidents of daily occur- 
rence. But without careful study we cannot credit the absolutism of its sway over 
literature, the education, the social life, the religion even, of the Southern States. 
No man there dares to write, or print, or speak a word iu reprobation of slavery. 
The editor in his chair, the writer at his desk, the clerg.ynian in his pulpit, receive 
their orders from slavery, and must do its bidding. Whatever logic and reason 
may say, whatever lessons history may teach, whatever the principles of Christ- 
ian brotherhood may require, all must be svtbordinate and secondary to the 
higher law of slavery." 

TIITJELOW WEED. 

In Ilia paper of Dec. 8, 1858, Mr. Weed, who, with rare ability and 
success, has long conducted the Albany Ecening Journal, says: 

'•It has always been the practice of doughface politicians to argue as if the 
j)rospority of the North depended upon the degradation of the South, and to urge 
us to connive at the spread of slavery in order to drive a profitable trade with it. 
These arguments are as uiiphilosophical as they are unmanly. The States are so 
linked by commerce that whatever benefits one, benefits all, and whatever clogs 
the energies of one is a drag upon the prosperity of the united whole. The trade 
between the North and South is brisk, but it would be threefold as great, had no 
slave ever been imported from the Guinea Coast, and if each section now had the 
products of its own intelligent labor to exchange for those of the other. Let the 
New England or New York merchant or mechanic, who has been deceived by this 
doughface plea, ask himself whether his branch of business is the better or the 
worse for having in the Union such young, vigorous and Free States as Ohio, 
Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota, and whether it would 
be worse or better for him, if they had come in slaveholding communities like 
Arkansas, Texas and Florida?" 

J. WATSON WEBB. 

In his paper of Oct. -1, 185G, Gen. "Webb, the veteran editor of the 
New York Courier and Enquirer, says : 

" It is idle, it is worse than idle, for Southern men or for ourselves, to blind the 
eyes to the fact that it is the sense of the civilized world that African slavery is a 
dishonor and a reproach to the American Republic. The fact that the principal 
nations of Europe have abolished it at a sacrifice, and set it down in the catalogue 
of Climes, is, in itself, irrefragable proof of the fact. And this sense weighs most 
heavily upon those Europeans who have the most adequate appreciation of the 
grandeur of our Ilepublic, and the glorious principles upon which it is framed. 
The venerable Humboldt speaks as the representative of all that is most liberal 
and enlightened in the mind of Iilurope, when he says : 

" ' But thei-e is one thing, sir, which grieves me more than I can describe, and that is the 
liolicy you have lately adopted in regard to slavery. I am not so unreasonable as to expect 
that you slioulil instantly einancipate your slaves. I know well the formidable difficulties that 
you have to contend with in solving the problem of slavery. But what occasions deep sorrow 
and pain, believe me, to all loveis of your great country, is to And that, instead of adopting 
any means, however slow and gradual, to relieve yourselves of it, you are constantly trying 
to extend and consolidate a system which is not only opposed to all the principles of morality, 
but, as it appears to me, is pregnant with appalling and inevitable dangers to the future of 
the Republic itself. Tell your countrymen this from me.' 

" Every man in the civilized world, who has a life to live in this nineteenth cen- 
tury, has an interest in this struggle. Whether they arc on the immediate field or 
not, they all nuist more or less participate iu its fortunes. Human hearts have 
tlieir affinities and mutual influences, which distance cannot dissipate, or difference 
in outward circumstances neutralize. Ideas, too, in tliese times, are winged ; and 
whether good or evil, they find, fly where they may. principles and aims german 
to, if not identical with, those they serve in the land of Ihoir origin, or at least the 
conditions out of which such principles and aims may r)Miii}>-. Th'i y are as sure 
everywhere of tlie same human nature a; of the sain:; i>mb' iil i, !.i))u.ph'.re." 



TESTIMONY Oi' LIVINCt AVITNESSES. 159 

GAMALIEL BAILEY. 

As editor ami proprietor of the National Era, Dr. Bailey, of Wash- 
ington, D. 0., whose very able and consistent management of the paper 
has entitled him to the high regard of every trne lover of liberty, 
says : 

" The tGuJeiicy of siavery to diffuse itself, and to crowd out free labor, was early 
observed by American patriots, North and South ; and Mr. Jett'erson, the great 
apostle of iiepublicanism, made an effort in 1784 to cut short the encroaching tide 
of barbaric despotism, by prohibiting slavery in all the Territories of the Union, 
down to thirty-one degrees of latitude, which was then our Southern boundary. 
His beueiiceut purpose failed, not for want of a decisive majority of votes present 
in the Congress of the Confederation, but in consequence of the absence of the 
delegates from one or two States^ which were necessary to the constitutional ma- 
jority. When the subject again came uj), in 1787, Mr. Jefferson was minister to 
France, and the famous ordinance of that year was adopted, prohibiting slavery 
North and West of the Ohio River. Between 1784 and 1787, the strides of slavery 
westward into Tennessee and Kentucky, had become too considerable to admit of 
the policy of exclusion ; and besides those regions were then integral parts of 
Virgiiiia and North Carolina, and of course they could not be touched without the 
couseut of tlio^e States. In 1S20, another efitbrt was made to arrest the progress 
of slavery, which threatened to monopolize the whole Territory west of the 
Mississippi. In the meantime the South had apostatized irom the faith of Jefferson. 
It had ceasjd to love universal libert}', and the growing importance of the cotton 
culture had caused the people to look with indifference upon the moral deformity of 
slavery ; and, as a matter of course, the politicians became its apologists and 
defenders. After a severe struggle a compromise was agreed upon, by which 
Missouri was to be admitted with slavery, which was the immediate point in con- 
troversy ; and slavery was to be excluded from all the territory north and west of 
that State. 

" We have shown, from the most incontestable evidence, that there is in slave 
society a much greater tendency to diffuse itself into new regions, than belongs to 
freedom, for the reason that it has no internal vitality. It caimot live if circum- 
scribed, and must, like a consumptive, be continually roving for a change of air to 
recuperate its wasting energies." 



nAREIET BEECIIER STOWE. 

In lier "Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin," Mrs. Stowe, whose name is 
evcrywliere wreathed and immortalized on the scrolls of liberty, 
says : 

" Slavery is a simple retrogression of society to the worst abuses of the jniddle 
ages. We must not, therefore, be surprised to find the opinions and practices of 

tlie middle ages, as to civil and religious toleration, prevailing It is 

!ii) child's play to attack an institution which has absorbed into itself so much of 
the political power and wealth of this nation. The very heart shrinks to think 
vi'h.it the faithful Christian must endure who assails tliis institution on its own 
ground; but ilmast be done. How was it at the North? There was a universal 
(dlbrt to put down the discussion of it here by mob-law. Printing-presses were 
broken, houses torn down, property destroyed. Brave men, however, stood firm : 
martyr blood was shed for the right of free opinion in speech ; and so the right of 
discussion was established. Nobody tries that sort of argument now — its day is 
past. In Kentucky, also, they tried to stop the discussion by similar means. Mob 
violence destroyed a printing press, and threatened the lives of individuals. But 
there were brave men there, who feared not violence or threats of death ; and 
emancipation is now open for discussion in Kentucky. The fact is the South must 
discuss the matter of slavery. She cannot shut it out, unless she lays an embargo 
on the literature of the whole civilized world ; if it be, indeed, divine and God-ap- 
pointed, why does she so treml)le to have it touched ? If it be of (lod, all tlie free 
inquiry in the world cannot overthrow it. Discussion must and will come. It only 
recpiires courageous men to lead the way." 



160 TESTIMONY OF LIVENG WITNESSES. 

MATTIE GRIFFITH. 

In lier very able and interesting " Autobiography of a Female Slave," 
a woi-k of fiction which is fuller of fact than any book of the kind that 
we have ever read — a work which, for vivid, accurate delineation of in- 
door life in the South, and for terse, graphic portrayal of slaveholding 
manners and morals, has no equal — Miss Griffith, one of Kentucky's 
truest and noblest daughters, who, by the emancipation of her own 
slaves, has set a lofty example of pure patriotism and benevolence, says, 
writing pointedly to the people of her native State : 

" By the oppression to wliicli we were subjected under the yoke of Britain, and 
against which we wrestled so long, so patiently, so vigorously, in so many ways, 
and at last so triumphantly, I adjure you to put an end, at once, and forever, to the 
disreputable and despotic business of holding slaves. African slavery, as practised 
in America, is oppression indeed, in comparison with which, that which drew forth 
our angry and bitter complaints against England, was very freedom. Let us, in- 
stead of perpetuating the infamous system of slavery, be true to ourselves ; let us 
vindicate the pretensions we set up when we characterize ours as the ' land of 
liberty, the asylum of the oppressed,' by proclaiming to the nations of the earth 
that, so soon as a slave touches the soil of the United States, his manacles shall 
fall from him : let us verify the words engraven in euduring brass on the old bell 
which, from the tower of Independence Hall, rang out our glorious Declaration, and 
in deed and in truth proclaim 'Liberty to the captive, and the opening of the prison 
doors to them that are bound.' As you value truth, honor, justice, consistency — 
aye, humanity even, wipe out the black blot which defiles the border of our 
escutcheon, and the country will then be in reality what it is now only in name, a 
/r«e country, loving liberty disinterestedly for its own sake, and for that of all 
peoples, and nations, and tribes, and tongues." 

SARAn M, GEIMKE. 

In her "Reasons for Action at the North," Miss Grimke, an estimable, 
right-minded lady, from South Cai'olina, says : 

"Let Northerners respectfully ask for an alteration in that part of the Constitu- 
tion by which they are bound to assist the South in quelling servile insurrections. 
Let them see to it that they send no man to Congress who would give his vote to 
the admLssion of another slave State into the national Union. Let them protest 
against the injustice and cruelty of delivering the fugitive slave back to his master 
as being a direct infringement of the Divine command, Let them petition their 
different Legislatures to grant a jury trial to the friendless, helpless runaway, and 
for the repeal of those laws whicli secure to the slaveholder his unjust claim to his 
slave, after he has voluntarily brought him within the verge of their jurisdiction, 
and for the enactment of such laws as will protect the colored man, woman, and 
child from the fangs of the kidnapper, who is constantly skulking about in the 
Northern States, seeking whom he may devour. Let the Northern churches refuse 
to receive slaveholders at their communion tables, or to permit slaveholding minis- 
ters to officiate in their pulpits." 

ANGELINA E. WELD. 

In her eloc^uent " Appeal to the Women of tlie N"omiaally Free States," 
Mrs. Weld, of New Jersey, formerly Miss Grimke, of South Carolina, 
says : 

" It is not the character alone of the mistress that is deeply injured by the posses- 
sion and exercise of despotic power, nor is it the degradation and suffering to which 
the slave is continually subject ; but another important consideration is, that in 
consequence of the dreadful state of morals at the South, the wife and the daughter 
sometimes find their homes a scene of the most mortifying, heart-rending prefer- 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES, 161 

ence of the degraded domestic, or the colored daughter of the head of the family. 
There are, alas, too many families, of which the coatentions of Abraham's house- 
hold is a fair example. But we forbear to lift the veil of private life any higher ; 
let these few hints suffice to give you some idea of what is daily passing behind that 
curtain which has been so carelully drawn before the scenes of domestic life in 
slaveholding America." 

JOHN C. UNDERWOOD. 

Kemonstratiiig against the consummate system of despotism which 
exiled him from his home and family in Virginia, in 1856, Mr. Under- 
wood says : 

" The history of the world, and especially of the States of this Union, shows most 
conclusively that public prosperity bears an almost mathematical proportion to the 
degree of freedom enjoyed by all the inhabitants of the State. Men will always 
work better for the cash than for the lash. The free laborer will produce and save 
as much, and consume and waste as little as he can. The slave, on the contrary, 
will produce and save as little, and consume and waste as much as possible. Hence 
States and countries filled with the former class must necessarily flourish and in- 
crease in population, arts, manufactures, wealth and education, because they are 
animated and incited by all the vigor of the will, while States and countries filled 
with the latter class, must exhibit comparative stagnation, because it is a universal 
law of nature that force and fear end in ruin and decay. We have an instructive 
example of the one class in the activity, enterprise, prosperity and intelligence of 
New England, and of the other in the pitiable condition of poor South Carolina, 
a State which, by neglecting the teachings of her Marions, and following her Butlers, 
her Brookses, her Keitts, and her Quattlebums, in the race of aristocracy and Afri- 
canization, is rapidly sinking into agricultural sterility, bloated egotism, and brutal 
barbarism, until she has most significantly adopted a cane for her emblem, which 
equally and strikingly tyijifles her military resources, and that imbecility and de- 
crepitude which, without something to lean upon, must inevitably fall into speedy 
death and dissolution." 

DANIEL E. GOODLOE. 

As assistant editor of the National Era^ the best centrally located 
Kepitblican paper in the country, Mr. Goodloe, formerly of North Caro- 
lina, says : 

" The history of the United States shows, that while the slave States increase in 
popvdation less rapidly than the free, there is a tendency in slave society to diffu- 
sion, greater than is exhibited by free society. In fact, difl'usion, or extension of 
area, is one of the necessities of slavery ; the prevention of which is regarded as 
directly and immediately menacing to the existence of the institution. This arises 
from tlie almost exclusive application of slave labor to the one occupation of agri- 
culture, and the difficulty, if not impossibility, of diversifying employments. Free 
society, on the contrary, has indefinite resom-cesof development within a restricted 
area. It will far excel slave society in the cultivation of the ground — first, on ac- 
count of the superior intelligence of the laborers ; and secondly, in consequence of 
the greater and more various demands upon the earth's products, where commerce, 
manufactures, and the arts, abound, llien, these arts of life, by bringing men to- 
gether in cities and towns, and employing them in the manufacture or transporta- 
tion of the raw materials of the farmer, give rise to an indefinite increase of wealth 
and population. The confinement of a free people within narrow limits seems only 
to develop new resources of wealth, comfort and happiness; while slave society, 
pent up, withers and dies. It must continually be fed by new fields and forests, to 
be wasted and wilted under the poisonous tread of the slave." 

BENJAMIN 8. HEDEIOK. 

For daring to have political opinions of his own, and because he did 
not deem it liis duty to conceal the fact that he loved liberty better than 
slavei-y, Prof. Hedrick, whose testimony we now offer, was peremptorily 
dismissed from his post as Analytical and Agricultural Chemist in the 



162 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

University of North Carolina, ignominiously subjected to the indignities 
of a mob, and then savagely driven beyond the borders of his native 
State. His tyrannical pei'seeutors, if not called to settle their accounts 
in another Avorld within the next ten years, will probably survive to 
repent of the enormity of their pro-slavery folly. 

In a letter vindicating his course at Chapil Hill — his only offence 
having been a mild expression of opinion in favor of Republicanism — 
Prof. H. says : 

"Of my neicrhbors, fiiends and kinilred, nearly one-half have left the State since I 
was old enough to remember. Many is the time I have stood by the loaded emigrant 
wagon, and given the parting hand to those whose faces I was never to look upon 
again. They were going to seek homes in the free West, knowing, as they did, that 
free and slave labor could not both exist and prosper in the same community. If any 
one thinks that I speak without knowledge, let him refer to the last census. He 
will there find that in ISoO there were fifty-eight thousand native North Carolinians 
living in the free States of the West — thirty-three thousand in Indiana alone. There 
were, at the same time, one hundred and "eighty thousand Virginians living la the 
free States. Now, if these people were so much in love with the ' institution,' why 
did they not remain where they could enjoy its blessings? 

" From my knowledge of the people ofNorth Carolina, I believe that the majority 
of thera who will go to Kansas during the next five years, would prefer that it 
should be a free State. I am sure that if I were to go there I should vote to ex- 
clude slavery.'-' 

MONCTTRE D. COXWAT. 

In his volume entitled " Tracts for To-day," Mr. Conway, of Cincin- 
nati, Ohio, formerly of Virginia, says : 

"As a Virginian, with no ties of relationship northward of the remotest kind, 
past or present. I feel how easily I might slide into a justification of my dear 
mother, the South. But the soul knows no prejudices or sections, and must see all 

under tlie pure light of reason and conscience I fear that, with the 

majority of us, the binding of a slave is not so horrible as the doubting of a 
miracle The first error of the South has been an impatience in the dis- 
cussion of the slavery question, reminding calm men of those unfortunate persons 
met with iu lunatic asylums, who speak rationally on all topics until you touch that 
on which they are deranged, when their insanity bursts wildly forth. This has 
caused them to put themselves in an attitude before the world which has brought 
down its severest censure ; and, feeling that this was not just what they deserved— 
since they were at least sincere— it has led them on to a still greater rage against a 
judgment which, however unfair, was the result of their own mistaken heat. It 
has precluded freedom of discussion even among themselves, a pohcy which no 
human brain or heart ever respected yeih The native sons of the South have 
again and again sought to discuss it in their own vicinities, and have as often been 
threatened and visited with angry processes, though the privilege is secured to thera 
in the Bill of Rights of nearly every Soutliorn State. The South has thus lost the 
confidence of many of her own children, who find that a freedom exercised by 
tlieir lonlly ancestors, Wasliington, Jefiferson, Henry, and by them transmitted 
as an eternal inheritance, is now denied tliem by men who, beside those, are 
lilliputian." 

J. E. SNODGRASS. 

Vindicating liis course, as editor of the Baltimore Saturday Visitor, 
against an unsuccessful attempt of certain members of the Maryland 
Legislature, in 1846, to suppress his paper and procure his imprison- 
ment, Dr. Snodgrass, of Virginia, more recently of Maryland, now of 
Now York, said : 

" There need be no fear of my arraying the slave against his master (as I have 
been charged with doing), however anxious I may be to array the sympathies of 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 163 

the master in favor of his slave ; in other -words, to bring about the abolition of 
slavery in Jlaryland by lawful as Tvell as peaceful means, and with results which 
shall convince my accusers that I have been the best friend of both master and 
slave, and that the adoption of such views as I have been wont to promulge on all 
suitable occasions, both in the Visiiw and in m}' private intercourse with my 
fellow-citizens, would be the surest guaranty of the glorious redemption of Mary- 
land from the thralldom of an institution which has been her ever-present curse, 
hanging, as it does, like an incubus upon the prosperity of the State, and utterly 
crushing her every hope of future progress." 

JOHX G. ¥EE. 

lu his " xVuti-Slavery Manual," Mr. Fee, a noble, self-sacrificing 
proacliev of a free Gospel in Kentucky, says : 

" Slavery causes the slaves to disregard the relation of marriage and practise the 
conseffuent vice, concubinage. In our laud, marriage, as a civil ordinance, the}' do 
not enjoy. Our laws do not recognize this relation among them, nor defend it, nor 
enforce its duties. This would interfere with the claims and interest of the master. 
Hence, to use the language of the slaves themselves, they ' take up with one 
another.' And this continues as long as then- own convenience, and that of the 
master, requires. 

"Marriage is the great preservative against the abhorrent vices of concubinage 
and adultery. It islhe origin of those strong ties which cement and bind together 
society. It is the fountain of the dearest earthly pleasures that man enjoj-s^ 
domestic bliss. Without it, the endearing relations of husband and wife, parent 
and child, would be unkuovv'n. Without it, man and woman would wander forth, 
selfish, shameless, and unrestrained, like one vast herd of brutes. And yet the 
very tendency of our sj-stem of slavery is to abolish it. Christians ! yea, all lovers 
of virtue and order ! what would you think, and how would you act, did these evils 
exist to the same extent among the whites? And are they any the less ruinous to 
societi), and any the less criminal in the sight of God, in the black man than in the 
white man? How many there are among us who are parents, aud yet know no 
one whom they can call husband or wife ! And how many, even of those in whose 
veins courses much of the blood of the white man, who know not their parents ! 
Oh ! is it true that there is a single woman in the whole South who is opposed to 
the abolition of slavery, when she remembers how many bosoms have been wrung 
with anguish at the reflection that the husbands of their choice have been unfaith- 
ful, in cases that never would have occurred had it not been for slavery? And I 
will ask one more question. Is there in our State, even among Christians, as much 
regard for the puriry of the marriage relation of their slaves, aud the proper descent 
of^'slave children, as there is to liave the best stock of sheep, hogs, cattle, to say 
nothing of horses? May God pardon our shameful neglect of a relation which he 
has so greatly honored." 

JAMES D. PEETTYMAN. 

As editor of tlie Peninsular l^eios and Advertiser^ published in Milford, 

Del., Dr. Prettynian, who is there laboring manfully for the right, says : 

" The great question to be settled by the people of this country in this the nine- 
teenth century is, whether this boasted land of freedom shall become a nation of 
masters and slaves, or whether it shall be made a land, tlie atmosphere of wliicli no 

slave can breathe and live a slave We were born in a land of 

slavery, liave lived in a land of slavery, and are now writing in a land which is 
deeply injured by slavery, and have had an opportunity to see and know something 
of its inhumanity and wrong. We often wonder by what process of reasoning men 
justify themselves in advocating the base, blighting in>titution. Slavery is bad 
policy, it is an obstacle to the prosperity of the State, it has a demoralizing eflect 
on both master and slave, it is the origin of inhumanity, injustice and crime ; but 
far above all other arguments, objections, and sentiments of policy stands the im- 
concealed truth, that it is wrong. It originated in wrong ; it is the greatest wrong 
of our age." 

JOHN DIXOX LONG. 

In his "Pictures of Slavery," the painting of which aroused the mob 
ocratic ire of iiis slaveholdiug neighbors, \\\\o forced him to leave \\q 



164: TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

State, Mr. Long, of Maryland, a minister of the IMethodist Episcopal 

Church, says: 

"It is contended that if the genei-al conference should make slaveholding a test 
of membershiiJ, the preachers will not attempt to carry it out in slaveholding ter- 
ritorj\ Very well. Then the responsibility will rest on the preachers and members 
of that particular locality. The church at large and the discipline would be free 
from slaveholding taint ; and brethren at the North and West would no longer have 
their cheeks mantled with shame, when intidels point to the dii^cipliue as it is. and 
prove that it allows men to hold human beings in ignorance and slavery, and will 
them at death to ungodly relatives, who may sell them as oxen. Let no man in 
the ministry or the laity of the M. E. Chm'ch leave her communion because her dis- 
cipline is not yet perfect ; but let him pray and labor, and lift up his voice against 
the abominations of chattel slavery, till a sound public opinion shall blow it away 
Uke chaff before the whirlwind." 

WILLIAM S. BAILEY. 

In his paper of May 13, 1859, in an article on the gubernatorial cam- 
paign, then progressing in his State, Mr. Bailey, the intrepid, mob-defy- 
ing, persevering editor ot the Free South, published in ISTewport, Xexi- 
tucky, says : 

" It must strike the mind of every reflecting man in Kentucky, as something 
strange and abnormal, to see the rank and file of the two political parties in the 
State engaged in a rivalry for extending over the domain of the Union the system 
of human chattelism which has been a blight and a curse to their own common- 
wealth. Such mad-cap zeal and transparent folly cannot long sway the minds of 
intelligent and honest men. There must be a reaction speedily, unless the propa- 
gandists succeed in carrying their measures, and in binding the white freemen of 
the country in fetters, before they become aroused to the impending danger. 

" The present discussion, though of little moment in itself considered, may have 
some beneficial results. It may open the eyes of some men who have heretofore 
seemed half asleep, to the humiliating and disgraceful fact that our governments, 
State and National, are fast becoming mere engines for the perpetuation and pro- 
pagation of slavery. In this direction, they are impelled by the slave-holding oli- 
garchy, which aims at nothing short of the entire subjection of the whole country 
to the iron wiU of its despotism." 

EICHAED niLDEETH. 

[n his "Despotism in America," Mr. Ilildreth, the eminent historian, 
says: 

" Slavery is a continuation of the state of war. It is true that one of the comba- 
tants is subdued and bound ; but the war is not terminated. If I do not put the 
captive to death, this apparent clemency does not arise from any good will toward 
him, or any extinction on my part of hostile feelings and intentions. I spare h's 
life merely because I expect to be able to put him to a use more advantageou.- v.> 
myself. And if the captive, on the other hand, I'eigns submission, still he is o.: v 
watching for an opportunity to escape my grasp, and if possible to inflict upon mo 
evils as great as those to which I have subjected him. 

" War is justly regarded, and with the progress of civilization it comes every 
day more and more to be regarded, as the very greatest of social calamities. The 
introduction of slavery into a community, amounts to an eternal protraction of that 
calamity, and a universal diflusion of it through the whole mass of society, and that 
too, in its most ferocious form." 

O. B. FEOTHINOnAM, 

In his speecli before the American Auti-Slavery Society, in New York, 
May 8, 185G, ilr. Frothingliam inquired : 

" When shall we learn to speak plainly and sincerely against slavery, and to fol- 
low up our speech by our deeds ? When shall we learn to throw our whole action 
unreservedly on the side of God ? When will we believe that he who seeks first 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 1G5 

the kinprdom of heaven shall have everything; else added to him? They threaten us 
with war if we take this position. Useless threat! The war is already declared ! 
The war has already begun ! The war has been raging for half a century ! Slavery 
itself is a caaditioa of war. It had its origin iu war, its first victims being cap- 
tives of the spear. It lives by war — its agents being perpetually engaged in lo- 
menting feuds between the native princes of Africa to gain material for their traffic. 
It protects itself by war — it hides behind walls and gates — it rings alarm bells ; its 
barracks are guarded liy armed patrols — it never walks abroad without bowie- 
knife and pistol — it appears in Boston, and the streets bristle with files of soldiery 
— the hall of justice is stunned by the din of arms — outcast ruflians and murderers 
stalk about insulting the citizens. It extends itself by war, riding into Kansas with 
rifle and halter, to conquer a territory it has stolen ; substituting martial for civil 
law, and proclaiming the warrior's axiom that might is right. The very virtues 
incident to a state of slavery, the virtues of the dominant class, are vrarlike virtues 
such as belong to the soldier alone. The dashing recklessness, the hot-blooded 
chivalry, the lavish generosity, the fiery sense of honor, the careless gaiety, the 
frank, easy, good nature, the impetuous passion, whether of love or hate, the 
swaggering grace, the luxury, all mark the soldier. Such qualities are peculiar to 
feudal, which is military, society. Slavery is ever breathing menaces of war. On 
the least provocation it offers battle. For fifty years it has kept the country on 
the brink of civil broils. Only the greatest m,oderation on our part has saved us 
from bloodshed. It has submitted Boston to martial rule ; it is waging war in Kan- 
sas. The North stands on the defensive with a pistol pointed at her breast. What 
is to be done ? We must fight — iu behalf of peace and order we must fight." 

PAEKE GODWIN. 

In Ms volume entitled " Political Essays," Ivlr. Godwin, who always 

treats his subjects with remarkable elucidation and thorouglmess, says : 

" When the Constitution of the United States was formed, slavery existed in 
nearly all the States ; but it existed as an acknowledged evil, which, it was hoped, 
the progress of events would, in the course of a few yeai's, extinguish. With the 
exception of South Carolina, there was not a State in which some decided efforts 
had not been made toward its alleviation and ultimate removal. It was this feel- 
ing, that it was an evil, and that it would soou \>e abated, wliich excluded all men- 
tion of slavery by name from the Constitution, and which led to the adoption of such 
phraseology, In the parts referring to the subject, that they do not necessarily imply 
its existeac'e. The Constitution was made for all time, while the makers of it sup- 
posed slavery to be but a transient fact, and the terms of it consequently were 
adapted to the larger purpose, and not to the temporary existence. A jurist from 
the interior of China, who knew nothing from the actual condition of our country, 
or Justinian, could he arise from the dead, would never learn, from the mere read- 
ing of that instrument, of the existence of slavery. He would read of ' personsheld 
to service,' and of certain ' other persons,' who were to be counted only as three- 
fifths in the distribution of representative population ; but he would never imagine 
them, unless expressly told, a species of property. The general sentiment was 
averse to slavery, and the men of the Revolution were unwilling to recognize it, 
except in an indirect and roundabout way, and then only, as they exp ;cted, for a 
limited period." 

CnAELES W. ELLIOTT. 

In the second volume of his excellent History of New England, Mr. 

Elliott says : 

" A State is good or bad exactly in the degree in which it secures to each and all 
liberty to act out their individual natures according to the true principles of liuman- 
ity and justice. Perfect society is complete individuality, acting in harmony with 
true law. The love of society is one of the strongest instincts of man's nature ; it 
is a necessity. A hermit, therefore, is a monster, and anarchy impossible. It is 
also true that change and re-formation are a law of nature, opposed by stupidity, 
timidity, and selfish inaction. It is clear, too, that governments have, heretofore, 
been organized and upheld by the few for their own benefit, and the world has 
had only aristocracies and class legislation. The Republics of Greece and Rome 
were not republics, for they rested on a writhing people held in slavery. No such 
governments can or ought to continue long in peace, for revolt is the only remedy 
lor the oppressed New England has done much tc colonize and 



IGG TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSI':S. 

civilize tlic wide Vrestern prairies, and wherever lier men and women go, order, 
decency, industry, and education prevail over barbarism and violence. But she 
has more work to do ; we may hope that ?he will shake otT that old man of the sea 
who linugs upon her — may more fully learn that principle is above ])rotit, and a 
sound heart is better than a silver dollar — tliat she will lay iier hand to the bnildin;^ 
up of {ralleries, and museums, and libraries, as well as of mills and workshops; and 
that she will not fear to meet and drive Tiack the black brood of slavery to its own 
place, and assert, and maintain, and extend the rule of Right over Jlight : so that 
in the future, Democracy — the rights of all — may everywhere prevail over Aristo- 
cracy, which secures the iirivileges of the few, but perpetuates the wrongs of the 
many." 

■WILLIAM HEXRT BUELEIGH. 

In a volume of Lis fugitive poems, the reading of whicli has affordecl 
us a high degree of pleasure, Mr. Burleigh says : 

" Now, tyrants ! look well to your path! 

A cloud shall come over your fame, 
And the terrible storm of a free people's wrath, 

Overwhelm you with anguish and shame ! 
To years and to ages unborn, 

Throughout every kindred and clime. 
Ye shall be as a bj'-word, a hissing and scorn, 

To the pure and the good of all time ! 
The curse of the slave and the taunt of the free 

Henceforth and forever your portion shall be ! 



" Thank God ! that a limit is set 

To the reach of the tyi-ant's control ! 
That the down-trodden serf may not wholly forget 

The right and the might of his soul ! 
That though years of oppression may dim 

The ttre on the heart's altar laid, 
Yet, lit by the breath of Jehovah, like Him 

It lives, and shall live, undecaj-ed ! 
Will the flres of the mountain grow feeble and die ? 

Beware !— for the tread of the Earthquake is nigh !" 

OHAELES 0. BURLEIGH. 

On the suhject of "Slavery and the North," Mr. Burleigh says: 

" The question of slavery is nndeniablj', for this country at least, the great ques- 
tion of the age. On the right decision of it depend interests too vast to be litly 
set forth in words. Here are three millions of slaves in a land calling itself free ; 
three millions of human beings robbed of every right, and, by statute and custom, 
among a people self-styled Christian, held as brutes. Knowledge is forbidden, and 
religious worship, if allowed, is clogged with letters ; the sanctity of marriage is 
denied ; and home and family and all the sacred names of kindred, which form tlie 
dialect of domestic love, are made unmeaning words. The soul is crushed, that the 
body may be safely coined into dollars. And not occa-^ioually, by here and there 
a hardened villain, reckless alike of justice, law, and pu))lic sentiment ; fearing not 
God nor regarding man; but on system, and by the combined strength of the whole 
nation. Most men at the North, and many even at the South, admit that this is 
wrong, all wrong — in morals, in policy every way wrong — that it is a gross injus- 
tice to the slave, a serious evil to the master, a great calamity to the country ; that 
it belies the nation's high professions, brings deep disgrace upon its character, and 
exposes it to unknown perils and disasters in the time to come." 

J. MILI.EE m'kIJI. 

In his speech in the City Assemhly Eooms, New York, May 11, 1859, 
Mr. McKim said: 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 167 

"What the au'i-siave trade agitation did iucidentally for Enghind.the anti-sluveliold- 
iug agitatiou is doing collaterally for this coimtry. It is rectifying public s(;iitiiiu'iit on 
all great questious of prerogative aud duty. It is iinproviug our politics, uieliorat- 
ing our religion, and raising the standard of public and social morals. The evidence 

of this is so palpable, that no one with eyes can fail to see it In 

religion, the change, though less easily measured, is none the less striking. Eccle- 
siastically, as well as politically, anti-slavery has been a benefactor. It has stripped 
hypocrisy of its disguise, and divested priestcraft of much of its power for evil. Let 
nie not be misunderstood ; I use this language in no sectarian sense. In what 1 say 
I allude to mere professional clergymen ; men who live by religion as demagogues 
do by politics ; Protestant as well as Catholic Tetzels, who peddle Christianity as a 

trade, and subsist on its profits The literature of the country has 

been revolutionized by our movement. Anti-slavery publications used to be burned 
in Charleston, and drowned in Philadelphia. Paulding and Park Benjamin, an"d the 
like, held sway in the republic of letters. Carey and Hart expurgated Longfellow's 
poems to increase their profits, and Hildreth aud Whittier were only read by such 
as found their way into the anti-slavery office. How changed is everything now. 
The entire literature of the country— everything that is worthy of the name— is 
against slavery. Pro-slavery booksellers grow rich on anti-slavery novels, and pan- 
dering theatrical managers put money in their purses from abolition dramas. All 
the best daily aud weekly journals, aud monthly and quarterly magazines are anti- 
slavery." 

■WILLIAM nENKY FUENESS. 

In Lis "Derby Lecture," Dr. Furness, of Philadelpliia, says: 

"Kwe possessed the good that God hath showed us, were we obedient to his 
requisitions, were we to do justly, the fetters of the slave would disappear as if con- 
sumed by fire before the majestic and, all-commanding sense of justice expressed in 
the action of the free Northern heart. Does any one ask at this late day, when the 
giant wrong which our country legalizes and fights for, threatens to strip us of the 
deM-est attributes of freedom and hiinumitv— does any one ask, what have we to do 
with the injustice that exists not here but in another part of the land? I answer 
freely, distinctly, emphatically, nothing. In simple justice we have no right to have 
anything to do with it. We Lave no right to stand guard over it as we do, with 
our unjust prejudices, more fatal than muskets or artillery. We have no right to 
surrender to it the sacred principle of freedom of speech, as we have done. VVe 
have no ri"-ht to afford it the broad protection of our silence, as we do. We have 
no rio-htto allow it to flourish in the capital of the nation as we do. We have no 
ri<--ht°to aid in extending and perpetuating and fighting for it, as, may God have 
mercy on us ! we have done, aud are doing. As we are doing all these unjust 
things, we are guilty of interfering most impertinently with things with which we 
have no right to interfere. We must turn over a new leaf, and learn, hard as the 
lesson mav be, to mind every one his own business. And what is our business f 
Whv. to do justly. It is what God specially requires of us, to cease from doing- 
evil- to maintaiu freedom of speech, that precious thing without^ which our civil 
security is but stubble, which the outbursting fires of violent passions may at any 
moment consume ; to guard the public liberties in the person of the meanest of the 
laud; to destroy injustice of all kinds, and let the_ voice ot humanity, the swelling 
key-note of the world, be heard, pleading for the right. 

A. D. MATO. 

In liis new miscellaneous work, " Symbols of the Capital," a volume 
full of vigorous essays and foscinating delineations of life in tbe Euipire 
State, Mr. Mayo says : 

" The qut^stion of free labor is not to be argued so much frcm its eco'iomical 
results, though here the argument is triumphant, as from 't;^ ^P>>-'t"al fleets En ery 
Lue son of Adam will maintain that the happiest word that ever greeted his eai s was 
M command to leave the Eden of childish ^l^'^'^'^^^^J^^''''^^^^^^^^ 
Free industry is for the elevation and education of the race. All human expuence 
lias demonstLted that the only way to greatness of ^^"^^^^^^^^^^1 
vow wT,v of labor. And when man toils, m the exercise oi his gieat atti louie oi 
^d Sli^^'the^ayto gain his chi-f ^'f-"^i°- {^f^^^^J^^'^SJ^^^ 
attribute of man, the point in which he approaches nearest his Makei. io cieatc n. w 



168 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

combinations from the material universe; by the discipline of free industry to discover 
the creative laws of Omnipotence, and by obedience to them to express his best 
conceptions of existence ; to impress himself on the ■whole earth, and even fill the 
invisible elements with the finer energy of his victorious mind ; especially to create 
lathe realm of spirit ; molding human nature into higher forms of individual and 
Social life, and by a far-reaching insight, peopling the realms of imagination with 
new and glorious beings, which bear the seal of reality, and become the ideals of 
tlie generations. This is God-like, and only through Free Labor can man approach 
tliis throne of his power, and rise into the companionship of the creative love of the 
Father of all." 

THOMAS DAVIS. 

In the course of one of the best speeches ever made on the Kansas 
question — a speech replete with irrefutable facts and arguments — the 
delivery of which, in the House of Representatives, May 9, 1854, at 
once distinguished him in Congress and throughout the country, Mr. 
Davis, of Rhode Island, said : 

"The despotism of slavery is not standing on its own basis, or defended by its 
own power, force, or ingenuity. It calls to its aid, and insists upon the obliga'tion 
enforced by the doctrine that the Constitution of the United States requires of the 
general government to protect, maintain, and extend slavery. It is no longer an 
evil to be tolerated or endured, but, in the estimation of its fanatical advocates, it 
is to be extended and perpetuated. 

" It is maintained by the combined power of monarchy, as represented in the 
Executive, wielding all the patronage of government by directly rewarding those 
who are subservient to its dictates, and proscribing all who dare to exercise with 
open manliness the right of American freemen, in condemnation of its rank injus- 
tice. 

" Next, we have the slaveowners, who are an aristocracy not elected by or sub- 
ject to any higher poAver, but firmly united by ties of common interest, ownership, 
and absolute control, amounting to a state of perpetual warfare where the weapons 
are all in the hands of one party. These combinations of power, monarchy, and 
oligarchy, might be deemed ample for the maintenance of their unholy ascendency ; 
but, sir, it seems it is not enough, for we have now a new proclamation in its 
defence. It finds itself incapable, with the weapons it has heretofore wielded, of 
accomplishing its purposes, and it now demands that the great and vital doctrine 
of the sovereignty of the people is peculiarly its own. Thus we have the combina- 
tion of monarchy, or the powers of one man— oligarchy, or the favored few ; and 
democracy, or the powers of the whole people. Seizing upon this last prin- 
ciple, it profanes its holy name, using it for the purpose of sustaining a 
system destructive of all human rights; for just in proportion as men feel the 
force and grandeur of their own nature and being, will they regard with sacred 
reverence the rights of others, which, in a republic, must be their highest security. 
Chattel slavery strikes at the root of this individual conviction, and is, to an alarm- 
ing extent, destructive of the principles of self-government." 

FEEDERICK LAW OLITSTED. 

In his " Seaboard Slave States," Mr, Olmsted, the eminently clever 
and competent superintendent of the great Central Park, in New York 
city— a traveller and author of exquisite discernment and indubitable 
veracity, writing from Norfolk, in Virginia, says : 

"Incidents, trifling in themselves, constantly betrav to a stran"-er the bad 
economy of usmg enslaved servants. The catastrophe of one such occurred since 
1 began to write this letter. I ordered a fire to be made in my room, as I was 
gomg out this mornmg. On my return, I found a grand fire— the room door hav- 
ing been closed and locked upon it, and, by the way, I had to obtain assistance to 
open It, the lock being ' out of order.' Just now, while I was writing, down 
tumbled upon the floor, and rolled away close to the valance of the bed, half a 
hr«\ fnll Of i-nitcd coal, wh.ch li;...! been so piled up on the diminutive grate, and 
iett without a fender or any gu.uJ, that this result was almost inevitable. If I had 



TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 169 

not returned at the time 1 did, the bouse -n-ould have been fired, and probably an 
incendiary charged with it, while some Northern Insurance Company made good the 

loss to the owner Such carelessness on the part of these enslaved servants 

j'ou have momentarily to notice. The constantly-occurring delays, and the waste 
of time and labor that you encounter everywhere, are most annoying and provok- 
ing. The utter want of system and order, almost essential, as it would appear, 
where slaves are your instruments, is amazing. At a hotel, for instance, you go to 
j'our room and And no conveniences for washing; ring and ring again, and hear 
the oflBce-keeper ring and ring ag.ain. At length two servants appear together at 
at your door, get orders, and go away. A quarter of an hour afterward, perhaps. 

one returns with a pitcher of water," but no towels; and soon It 

is impossible that the habits of the whole community should not be influenced 
by, and be made to accommodate to these habits of its laborers. It irresistibly 
atfects the whole industrial character of the people. You may see it in the habits 
and manners of the free white mechanics and tradespeople. All of these must have 
dealings or be in competition with slaves, and so have their standard of excellence 
made low, and become accustomed to, until they are content with, slight, false, un- 
sound workmanship." 

THEODOEE D. WELD. 

Wielding a vigorous pen in behalf of a noble cause, the Pestalozzi of 

our country, Mr. Weld, founder and present principal of the famous 

eclectic school at Eagleswood, New Jersey, says : 

"There is not a man on earth who does not believe that slavery is a curse. 
Human beings may be inconsistent, but human nature is true to herself. She has 
uttered her testimony against slavery with a shriek ever since the monster was 
begotten; and till it perishes amidst the execrations of the universe, she will 
traverse the world on its track, dealing her bolts upon its head, and dashing 
against it her condemning brand. We repeat it. every man knows that slavery is 
a curse. Whoever denies this, his lips libel his heart. Try him ; clank the chains 
in his ears, and tell him they are for him ; give him an hour to prepare his wife and 
children for a life of slavery ; bid him make haste and get ready their necks for 
the yoke, and their wrists tbr the cofBe-chains, then look at his pale lips and trem- 
bling knees, and you have Nature's testimony against slavery." 

Thus, in the six last chapters inclusive, have we introduced a mass of 
anti-slavery arguments, human and divine, that Avill stand, irrefutable 
and convincing, as long as the earth itself shall continue to revolve in 
its orbit. Aside from unafi'ected truthfulness and candor, no merit is 
claimed for anything we have said on our own account. With the best 
of motives, and in the language of nature more than that of art, we have 
given utterance to the honest convictions of our heart — being impelled 
to it by a long-harbored and unraistalcable sense of duty which grew 
stronger and deeper as the days passed away. 

If half the time which has been spent in collecting and arranging 
those testimonies had been occupied in the composition of original mat- 
ter, the weight of paper and binding and the number of pages would 
have been much greater ; but the value and effect of the contents would 
have been far less. From the first, our leading motive has been to con- 
vince our fellow-citizens of the South, non-slaveholders and slaveholders, 
that slavery, whether considered in all its bearings, or, setting aside the 
moral aspect of the question, and looking at it only in a pecuniary point 
of view, is impolitic, unprofitable, and degrading ; how well, thus far, 
we have succeeded in our undertaking, time will, perhaps, fully disclose. 

5 



170 TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES. 

In the words of a contemporaneous German writer, whose language 
we readily and heartily indorse, " It is the shame of our age that 
argmnent is needed against slavery." Taking things as they are, how- 
ever, argument being needed, we have offered it ; and we have offered 
it from such sources as will, in our honest opinion, confound the devil and 
his incarnate confederates. 

These testimonies, culled from the accumulated wisdom of nearly 
sixty centuries, beginning with the great and good men of our own 
time, and running back through distant ages to Saint Paul, Saint John, 
and Saint Luke ; to Cicero, Plato, and Socrates, to Solomon, David, and 
Moses, and even to the Deity himself, are the pillars of strength and 
beauty upon which the popularity of our work will, in all probability, 
be principally based. If the ablest writers of the Old Testament ; if 
the eloquent prophets of old ; if the renowned philosophers of Greece 
and Eome ; if the heavenly minded authors and compilers of the New 
Testament ; if the illustrious poets and prose-writers, heroes, statesmen, 
sages of all nations, ancient and modern ; if God himself and the hosts 
of learned ministers whom he has commissioned to proclaim his 
word — if all these are wrong, then we are wrong ; on the other hand, 
however, if they are right, we are right ; for, in effect, we only repeat 
and endeavor to enforce their precepts. 

If we are in error, we desire to be corrected ; and, if it is not asking 
too much, we respectfully request the advocates of slavery to favor us 
with an expose of what they, in their one-sided view of things, conceive 
to be the advantages of their favorite and peculiar institution. Such 
an expose, if skillfully executed, would doubtless be regarded as the 
funniest novel of the times — a fit production, if not too immoral in its 
tendencies, to be incorporated into the next edition of D'Israeli's 
Curiosities of Literature. 



CHAPTER IX. 

FEEE FIGURES AND SLAVE, 

God flx'd it certain, that, whatever day 
Makes man a slave, takes half his worth away. 

Pope's Hojier. 

Under this heading we propose to introduce the remainder of the 
more important statistics of the Free and of the Slave States ; — especially 
those that relate to Commerce, Manufactures, Internal Improvements, 
Education and Religion. Originally it was our intention to devote a 
separate chapter to each of the industrial and moral interests above- 
named; but other considerations have so greatly encroached on our 
space, that we are compelled to modify our design. To the thoughtful 
and discriminating reader, however, the chief statistics which follow 
will be none the less interesting for not being the subjects of annotation. 

At present, all we ask of the pro-slavery men, no matter in what part 
of the world they may reside, is to look these figures fairly in the face. 
We wish them to do it, in the first instance, not on the platforms of 
public debate, where the exercise of eloquence is too often characterized 
by violent passion and subterfuge, but in their own private apartments, 
where no eye save that of the All-seeing One will rest upon them, and 
where, in considering the relations which they sustain to the past, the 
present, and the future, an opportunity will be afforded them of securing 
that most valuable of all possessions attainable on earth, a conscience 
void of ofl:ence toward God and man. 

Each separate table or particular compilation of statistics will afford 
food for at least an hour's profitable reflection ; indeed, the more these 
figures are studied, and the better they are understood, the sooner wUl 
the author's object be accomplished — the sooner will the genius of Uni- 
versal Liberty dispel the dark clouds of slavery. 

171 



172 



FREE EIGUBES AND SLAVE. 



T^f^JBLE 13. 

TONNAGE, EXPORTS AXD IMPORTS OF THE FREE AND OF THE SLAVE 

STATES— 1S55. 



Frea 
States. 


Tonn;ige. 


Expons. 


Imports. 


S1;ltC 
Siatei. 


Tonnage. 


Exports. 


Imports. 


Cal 


92,623 


$8,224,066 


$5,951,379 


Ala. ... 


36,274 


$14,270,585 


$619,964 


Conn.... 


137,170 


873,874 


636,826 


Ark. . . . 








Illinois. 


63,797 


547,053 


54,509 


Del. . . . 


19,186 


68,087 


5,821 


Indiana 


8,698 






Florida. 


14,335 


1,403,594 


45,998 


Iowa. .. 








Georgia 


29,505 


7,543,519 


273,716 


Maine.. 


800,557 


4,351,207 


2,927,443 


Ky 


22,680 






Mass. . . 


970,727 


28,190.925 


45,113,774 


La 


204,149 


55,367,962 


12,900,821 


Mich... 


69,490 


568,091 


231,379 


Md 


234,805 


10,395,934 


7,788,949 


N. H. . 


80,330 


1,523 


17,786 


Miss 


2,475 




1,661 


N. J.... 


121,020 


687 


1,473 


Mo 


60,592 






N. Y. . . 


1,404,221 


113,731,238 


164,776,511 


N. C. . . 


60,077 


433,818 


243,033 


Ohio... 


91,607 


847,143 


600,656 


S. C. . . . 


60,935 


12,700,250 


1,588,542 


Penn... 


397,763 


6,274,338 


15,300,935 


Tenn. . . 


8,404 






R. I. . . . 


51,033 


336,023 


586,337 


Texas . . 


8,812 


916,961 


262,568 


Vt 


6,915 


2,895,463 


591,593 


Va 


92,788 


4,379,923 


855,405 


Wis. . . . 


15,624 


174,057 


48,159 












4,252,615 


$167,520,693 


$236,847,810 


855,517 


$107,480,688 


$24,586,523 



PRODUCT OF MANUFACTURES IN THE FREE AND IN TILE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



Free 


Value of An- 


Capital 


Hanils 


.'^lave 


y.ilne of An- 


Capital 


Hands 


States. 


nual pioluc^s. 


invested. 


empl'ed 


States. 


nual products. 


invested. 


empl'ed. 


California 


$12,862,522 


$1,006,197 


3,964 


Alabama 


$4,538,878 


$3,450,606 


4,936 


Conn 


45,110,102 


23,890,348 


47, 1 70 


Arkansas 


607,436 


324,065 


903 


Illinois. . . 


17,236,073 


6,38.5,337 


12,065 


Delaware 


4,649,296 


2,978,945 


3,888 


Indiana.. 


13,922,651 


7,941,002 


14,342 


Florida.. 


668,388 


547,060 


991 


Iowa 


3,551,733 


l,292,^75 


1,707 


Georgia . . 


7,0-6,525 


5,460,433 


8,373 


Maine. . . . 


24,664,135 


14,700,452 


23,073 


Kentucky 


24,.538,483 


12,.350,734 


24,335 


Mass 


151,137,145 


83,357,642 


16.5,933 


Louisiana 


7,320,948 


5.318,074 


6,437 


Michigan. 


10,976,394 


6,534,250 


9,290 


Maryland 


32,477,702 


14,758,143 


30,124 


N. Harap. 


23,164,503 


13,242,114 


27,092 


Miss 


2,972,038 


1,833,420 


3,178 


N. Jersey 


39,713,586 


22,184,7-30 


37,811 


Missouri. 


23,749,265 


9,079,695 


ie,s5o 


New \ork 


237,597,249 


99,904,405 


199,349 


N. C 


9,111,245 


7,252,225 


12,444 


Ohio ... 


62,647,259 


29,019,533 


51,489 


s. c 


7,063,513 


6,056,865 


7,0U9 


Penn 


:5.5,044,910 


94,473,310 


146,766 


Tenn. ... 


9,723,433 


6,975,279 


12,0.32 


Rhode Is. 


22,093,258 


12,923,176 


20,831 


Te.xas . . . 


1,165,538 


5.39,290 


1,066 


Vermont. 


8,570,920 


5,001, .377 


8,445 


Virginia . 


29,705,337 


18,109,993 


29,109 


Wisconsin 


9,293,063 
$842,536,058 


3,332,143 
$430,iM0,051 


6,089 
780,576 












$165,413,027 


$95,029,879 


161,733 



FREE riGITRES AND SLAVE. 



1T3 



MILES OF CANALS AND RAILROADS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES, 

1S54 — 1857. 



Free 
Stales. 


Canals, 
miles, 1854. 


Raih-oads, 
miles, 1857. 


Cost of Rail- 
roads, 1855. 


Slave Slates. 


Canals, 
miles, 1S54 


Railroads, 
miles, 1K57. 


Cost of Rail- 
roads, 1855. 


California 

Conn 

Illinois... 
Indiana.. 

Iowa 

Maine . . . 

Iilass 

Michigan. 
N. Hamp. 
N. Jersey 
New York 

Ohio 

Penn 

Rhode Is. 
Vermont.. 
^Visconsin 


61 

100 
367 

50 

100 

ii 

147 
989 
921 
936 


22 

600 

2,524 

1,806 

253 

442 

1,2S5 

600 

645 

472 

2,700 

2,869 

2,407 

85 

515 

629 


$25,224,191 
55,603,656 
29,585,923 
2,300,000 
1.3,749.021 
59,167,781 
22,370,397 i 
15,860,949 : 
13,840,030 

111,882,503 
67,798,202 
94,657,675 
2,614,484 
17,998,835 
5,600,000 


Alabama . 

Arkansas.. 

Delaware. 

Florida . . . 

Georgia . . 

Kentucky.. 

Louisiana.. 

Maryland.. 

Mississippi. 

Missouri. .. 

N.Carolina 

S. Carolina 

Tennessee. 

Te.xas 

Virginia . . . 


51 

14 

28 

486 
101 

184 

is 

50 

"is9 


484 

120 
86 

1,062 
306 
203 
597 
410 
189 
612 
706 
508 
57 

1,479 


$3,986,208 

600,000 

250,000 

17,034,802 

6,179,072 

1,731,000 

12,654,333 

4,520,000 

1,000,000 

6,847,213 

13,547,093 

10,436,610 

16,406,250 




3,6S2 


17,855 '$538,313,647 


1,116 


6,859 


$95,252,581 



T J^ 33 IL, E 16. 

BANK CAPITAL IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES— 1855. 



Free States. 


1 

Banls cnpiial. [ 


Slave States. 


ISauI; c'lpital. 


California 

Connecticut 


$15,597,891 
2,513,790 
7,281,934 

7,301,2.-)2 

54,492,600 

980,416 

3,626,0110 

5,314,885 

83,773,288 

7,166,581 

19,864,825 

17,511.162 

3,275,056 

1,400,000 




$2,296,400 








1,398,175 




Florida 






13,413,100 




Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Slaryland 

Mississippi, 


10,369,717 




20,179,107 


ftlicliigan 


10,411,874 
240,165 


New Jersey 

New York 




1,215,3:"8 




5,205,073 
16,6(13,253 


South Carolina 


Pennsylvania 


Tennessee 


6,717,848 






14.033,833 


Wisconsin 


Total 




Total 


$230,100,340 


$102,078,940 







174 



FEEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



T A. B 31. E 17. 

MILITIA FORCE OP THE FREE AND OF THE SLAVE STATES— 1852. 



Free States. 


Militia force. 


Slave States. 


Hiliiia force. 




51,649 
170,359 
53,918 

62,583 

119,690 

63,933 

82,151 

39,171 

265,293 

176,455 

276,(j70 

14,443 

23,915 

32,203 




76,C6-?- 


Connecticut 


Arkansas 


17,137 
9,229 

12,122 
57,812 
81,840 
43,823 
46,864 
86,0S4 
61,000 
79,448 


Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 


Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky 


Michigan 

New Hampshire 

New Jersey 


Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina 


Ohio 


55,209 
71 252 






Rhode Island 


Texas 

Virginia 

Total 


19,766 




125,128 


Wisconsin 




Total 


1,331,843 


792,876 



T ^ B L E 18. 

POST-OFFICE OPERATIONS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES— 1855. 







Total 


Cost of 






Total 


Cost of 




stamps sold. 


Postage 


Transport's 


Slave States. 


Sianips sold. 


Postage 


Transport's 






coUecieil. 


the mails. 






collected. 


the mails. 


California.. 


$81,437 


$284,591 


$135,386 


Alabama 


$44,514 


$104,514 


$226,816 


Connecticut 


79,284 


179,230 


81,463 


Arkansas 


8,941 


30,664 


117,659 


Illinois . . . 


105,252 


279,837 


280,038 


Delaware 


7,298 


19,644 


9,243 


Indiana .. 


60.578 


180,405 


190,480 


Florida . 


8,764 


19,275 


77,553 


Iowa 


28,198 


82,420 


84,423 


Georgia.. 


73,330 


149,063 


216,003 


Maine 


60,165 


151,358 


82,218 


Kentucky 


55,694 


130,067 


144,161 


Mass 


259,062 


582,184 


153,091 


Louisiana 


50,778 


133,753 


133,810 


Michigan . . 


49,763 


142,188 


148,204 


Maryland 


77,743 


191,485 


192,743 


New llamp. 


88,387 


95,609 


46,631 


Miss 


81,182 


78,739 


170,7^5 


New Jersey 


81,495 


109,697 


80,084 


Missouri. 


53,742 


139,652 


ib5,ii'.K; 


New York.. 


542,498 


1,883,157 


431,410 


N. 


34,235 


72,759 


148,249 


Ohio 


167,953 


452,643 


421,870 


S. C. ... 


47,368 


91,600 


192,210 


Penn 


217,293 


583,013 


251,833 


Tenn. . . . 


48,377 


108,686 


116,091 


Rhode Is. . . 


30,291 


53,624 


13,891 


Texas . . . 


24,530 


70,436 


209,936 


Vermont. . . 


86,314 


92,816 


64,437 


Virginia . 


96,799 


217,861 


245,592 


Wisconsin . 


83,538 


112,908 


92,842 












$1,719,513 


$4,670,725 


$2,608,295 


$666,845 


$1,553,198 


$2,885,953 



FEEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



175 



T^ B L. E 19. 

PUBLIC SCHOOLS OF THE FREE AND OP THE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



California 

Conn 

Illinois.. . 
Indiana.. 

Iowa 

Maine. . . . 

Mass 

Michigan. 
N. Hamp.. 
N. Jersey . 
New York 

Ohio 

Penn 

Rhode Is.. 
Vermont . 
Wisconsin 



Number. 



2 

1,656 

4,052 

4,S22 

740 

4,042 

8,679 

2,714 

2,381 

1,473 

11,530 

11,661 

9,061 

416 

2,731 

1,423 



62,483 



Teueliers. 



2 

1,787 

4,248 

4,860 

828 

6,540 

4,443 

8,231 

3,013 

1,574 

13,965 

12,886 

10,024 

518 

4,173 

1,529 



72,621 



Pupils. 



49 

71,269 

125,725 

161,500 

29,556 

192,815 

176,475 

110,455 

75,643 

77,930 

675,221 

484,153 

413,706 

23,130 

93,457 

58,817 



2,769,901 



Slave States, 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida . . 

Georgia.. 

Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississipiji 

Missouri.. 

N. C 

S. C 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Virginia . . 



Nnuiber 



1,152 
853 
194 
69 

1,251 

2,234 
664 
898 
782 

1,570 

2,057 
724 

2,680 
349 

2,930 



18,507 



Teachers. 



1,195 
355 

214 

73 

1,265 

2,306 

822 

986 

826 

1,620 

2,780 

739 

2,819 

360 

2,997 



19,307 



Pupils. 



28,880 

8,493 

8,970 

1,878 

82,705 

71,429 

25,046 

38,111 

18,746 

51,754 

104,095 

17,838 

104,117 

7,940 

07,363 



581,861 



T^B L E 3 O. 

LIBRARIES OTHER THAN PRIVATE IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE 
STATES-1850. 



Free States. 


Number. 


Volumes. 


Slave States. 


Number. 


Volumes. 


California 

Connecticut 


164 

152 

151 

82 

236 

1,462 

417 

129 

128 

11,013 

352 

893 

96 

96 

72 

14,911 


165,818 

62,486 

68,403 

5,790 

121,969 

684,015 

107,943 

85,759 

80,885 

1,760,820 

186,826 

863,400 

104,342 

64,641 

21,020 

3,888,234 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 


56 

3 

17 

7 

88 

80 

10 

124 

117 

97 

88 

26 

84 

12 

54 


20,623 

420 
17,950 




2,600 
31,788 
79,466 
26,,800 

125,042 
21,737 
75,050 
29,592 

107,472 
22,896 
4,230 
88,462 




Maine 

Massachusetts 

Michigan 

N, Hampshire 

New Jersey 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania 

Rhode Island 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 


Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina. . 
South Carolina . . 
Tennessee ...... 

Texas . 

Virginia 




695 


649,577 



176 



FKEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



T ^ 13 L. E 2 1. 

NEWSPAPERS AND PERIODICALS PUBLISHED IN THE FREE AND IN THE 

SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



Free States. 


Number. 


Copies printed 
annually. 


Slave States. 


Number. 


Copies printed 
annually. 


California 

Connecticut 


7 

46 

107 

107 

29 

49 

202 

53 

38 

51 

423 

261 

309 

19 

35 


761,200 
4,267,932 
5,102,276 
4,316,823 ; 
1,512,800 
4,203,064 : 
64,820,564 
3,247,736 
3,067,552 ! 
4,098,678 
115,385,473 
30,473,407 
84,898,672 
2,756,950 

<>, U^T fifiO, 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 


60 
9 
10 
10 
51 
62 
55 
68 
50 
61 
51 
46 
50 
34 
87 


2,662,741 
377,000 
421,200 




319,800 
4,070,868 








Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Jlaryland 

aiississippi 


6,582,838 


Massacliusetts 


12,416,224 
19,612,724 


New Hampshire . . 

New Jersey 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania 

Rhode Island 


1,752,504 
6,195,560 
2,020,564 
7,145,930 
6,940,750 
1,296,924 
9,223,068 


North Carolina . . 
South Carolina . . 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Virginia 


AVisconsin 


46 1 2',665',487 






1,790 334,146,281 


704 


81,083,693 



T ^ B L E 3 2. 

ILLITERATE WHITE ADULTS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES— 1850. 



Free States. 


Native. 


Foreign. 


Total. 


Slave States 


Native. 


Foreign. 


Total. 


California 


2,201 


2,917 


5,118 


Alabama 


33,618 


139 


83,757 


Conn. . . . 


626 


4,013 


4,739 


Arkansas 


16,792 


27 


16,819 


Illinois. . . 


34,107 


5,947 


40,064 


Delaware 


4,132 


404 


4,536 


Indiana. . 


67,275 


3,265 


70,.540 


Florida . . 


3,564 


295 


8,859 


Iowa 


7,043 


1,077 


8,120 


Georgia. . 


40,794 


406 


41,200 


Maine . . . 


1,999 


4,148 


6,147 


Kentucky 


64,840 


2,347 


66,687 


Mass 


1,055 


26,484 


27,539 


Louisiana 


14,950 


6,271 


21,221 


Michigan. 


4,903 


3,009 


7,912 


Maryland 


17,364 


3,451 


20,815 


N. llamp. 


893 


2,064 


2,957 


Mississippi 


13,324 


81 


13,405 


N. Jersey. 


8,370 


5.878 


14,248 


Missouri.. 


34,420 


1,861 


86,281 


New York 


23,241 


68,0.52 


91,293 


N. C 


73,226 


840 


73,566 


Ohio 


51,968 


9,062 


61,030 


s. c 


15,580 


104 


15,684 


Penn 


41,944 


24,939 


66,928 


Tennessee 


77,017 


505 


77,522 


Rhode Is.. 


981 


2,309 


3,340 


Texas 


8,037 


2,483 


10,525 


Vermont.. 


565 


5,624 


6,189 


Virginia.. 


75,868 


1,137 


77,005 


M isconsin 


1,459 


4,902 


6,361 


! 










248,725 


173,790 


422,515 


493,026 


19,856 


612,832 



FEEE FIGUBKS AND SLAVE. 



177 



T j^B 11. E 3 3. 

NATIONAL POLITICAL POWER OP THE FREE AND OP THE SLAVE STATES— 

1S59. 



Free States. 


Senators. 


Reps, in 
lower H. 

of CODg. 


Electoral 
votes. 


Slave States. 


Senators. 


Reps, in 
lower H. 
of Cong. 


Electoral 
Totes. 


California 

Connecticut. . . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 


2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 


2 
4 
9 
11 
2 


4 

6 

11 

13 

4 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky .... 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi .... 

Missouri 

N. Carolina.. . 
S. Carolina . . . 

Tennessee 

Texas 

A'irginia 


2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 
2 


7 
2 
1 
1 
8 

10 
4 
6 
5 
7 
8 
6 

10 
2 

13 


9 

4 

3 

3 

10 




6 8 
11 13 

4 t 6 

2 4 

3 1 5 

5 7 
33 85 
21 23 
25 2T 

2 4 

3 5 
3 5 


12 


Massachusetts. . 
Michigan ..... 

Minnesota 

New Hampshire 
New Jersey .... 

New York 

Ohio 


6 

8 
7 
9 

10 
8 

12 


Pennsylvania . . 
Rhode Island... 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 


4 
15 




34 


146 


180 


30 


90 


120 



T-A.B ni. E 3 4. 

POPULAR TOTE FOR PRESIDENT BY THE FREE AND BY THE SLATE STATES-. 

1356. 



Free 


Rep. 


Amer. 


Dem. 




Slave 


Rep. 


Amer. 


Dem. 




States. 


Fremont. 
20,8-39 


Fillmore. 
35,113 


Buchanan. 
51,925 


107,377 


States. 


Frem. 


Fillmore. 


Buch'n. 




Cal.... 


Ala.... 




25,552 


46,789 


75,291 


Conn.. 


42,715 


2,615 


34,995 


80,325 


Ark. . 




10,787 


21,910 


32,697 


Illinois 


96,1 S9 


37,444 


105,348 


288,981 


Del.... 


308 


6,175 


8,004 


14,487 


Ind. .. 


94,375 


22,386 


118,670 


235,431 


Florida 




4,833 


6,358 


11,191 


Iowa.. 


43,954 


9,180 


86,170 


89,304 


Ga.... 




42,228 


56,578 


98,806 


Maine. 


67,379 


3,325 


39,080 


109,784 


Ky.... 


314 


67,416 


74,642 


142,372 


Mass.. 


108,190 


19,626 


39,240 


167,056 


La. ... 




20,709 


22,164 


42,873 


-Mich.. 
N. H .. 


71,762 
38,345 


1,660 
422 


52,136 

32,789 


125,558 
71,556 


Md.. . . 
Miss... 


281 


47,460 
24.195 


39,115 
35,446 


86,856 
59,641 


N..I... 


28,338 


24,115 


46,943 


99,396 


Mo. . . . 




48,524 


58,104 


106,688 


N. Y.... 


276.907 


124,604 


195,878 


597,389 


N. C... 




36,886 


48,246 


85,132 


Ohio.. 


187,497 


23,126 


170,874 


386,497 


S. C*. 










Penn. . 


147,510 


82,175 


230,710 


460,395 


Tenn. . 




66,178 


73,638 


139,816 


U. I. . . 


11,467 


1,675 


6,580 


19,722 


Texas. 




15,244 


28,757 


44,001 


Vt 


39,561 


545 


10,569 


50,675 


Va.... 


291 


60,278 


89,826 


150,395 


■Wis. . . 


66,090 


579 


52,843 


119,512 


! 












1,340,618 


393,590 


1,224,750 


2,958,958 


1,194 


479,465 


609,587 


1,090,246 



No popular vote. 

8* 



ITS 



FEEE FIGUKES AND SLAVE. 



T-A-B LESS. 

VALUK OF CHURCHES IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES-1850. 



Free States. 



California 

Connecticut 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massachusetts . . 

Michigan 

NevT Hampsliire 
New Jersey.. .. , 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania. . 
Rhode Island. . 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 

Total .. 



Value. 



599, 
,532 
56S, 
285, 
,T94, 
,504, 
793, 
,433. 
,712: 
,539: 
,860, 
,853, 
,293, 
251 
512. 



400 
330 
305 
906 
412 
209 
8S8 
ISO 
,266 
,863 
,561 
059 
,291 
,600 
,655 
,552 



$67,773,477 



Slave States. 



Value. 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky 

Louisiana ... . 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina 
South Carolina. 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Vii'ginia 

Total.... 



741 
US6 
345 
600 
112 
o53 
495 
116 
,622 
,135 
,785 
,476 
,951 
944 
220 



$21,674,581 



rCA^ B L E 3 6. 

PATENTS ISSUED ON NEW INVENTIONS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE 

STATES— 1856. 



Free States. 


Patents. 


Slave Stat.-s. 


Patents. 




13 

142 

93 

67 

14 

42 

331 

22 

43 

78 

593 

189 

267 

18 

85 

83 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 


11 








8 




8 


Iowa 

Maine 


Georgia 

Kentucky 


13 
26 
30 


Michigan 

New Hampshire 

New Jersey 

New York 

Ohio 


Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina 


49 
8 

32 
9 

10 






23 


Rhode Island 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 


Texas 

Virginia 

Total 


4 

42 


Total 


1,929 


263 



FREE FIGURES AND SLA.VE. 



179 



a? ^V 13 JL, E 



7. 



BIBLE CAUSE AND TRACT CAUSE IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE 
STATES— 1855. 



Free Stales. 


Contributions 

for the 
Bible Cause. 


Oontribulious 

tor the 
Tract Cause. 


Slave States. 


Contributions 

for the 
Bible Cause. 


Contributions 

for the 
Tract Cause. 


California 

Connecticut 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massachusetts 

Michigan 

New Hamiishiie . . 

New Jersey 

New York 

Ohio 


$1,900 

24,528 

28,403 

6,755 

4,216 

6,449 

43,444 

5,554 

6,271 

15,475 

123,386 

25,753 

25,360 

2,669 

5,709 

4,790 

$319,667 


$ 5 

15,872 
8,7S6 
1,491 
2,005 
2,981 

11,492 
1,114 
1,288 
3,546 

61,233 
9,576 

12.121 

2,121 

2,867 

474 

$131,972 


t Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

1 Florida 

' Georgia 

I Kentucky 

1 Louisiana 

i Maryland 

; Mississippi 

' Missouri 

N. Carolina 

S. Carolina 

Tennessee 

Texas 

i Virginia 


$8,351 
2,950 
1,037 
1,957 
4,532 
5,956 
1,810 
8,909 
1,067 
4,711 
6,197 
3,984 
8,383 
3,985 
9,296 


$47T 

110 

163 

5 

1,463 

1,366 

1,099 

5,365 

267 

936 

1,419 

8,222 


Pennsylvania 

lihode Island 


1,807 

127 

6,894 


Wisconsin 






$68,125 


$24,725 



T ^ B X. E 3 8. 

MISSIONARY CAUSE AND COLONIZATION* CAUSE IN THE FREE AND IN THE 

SLAVE STATES— 1855-1856. 



Free States. 


Contril)ut!ons 
for Missiouary 
purposes, 1S55. 


Contributions 
for Colonization 
purposes, 1^56. 


Slave States. 


Contributions 
for Missioniuy 
purposes, 1855. 


Contributions 
for Colonization 
purposes, 1856. 


California 

Connecticut. . . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 


$ • 192 

48,044 

10,040 

4,705 

1,750 

13,929 

128,505 

4,935 

11,963 

19,946 

172,115 

19 890 


$ 1 

9,2.33 

&43 

34 

3 

1,719 

1,422 

4 

1,130 

3,261 

24,371 

2,687 

4,287 

2,125 

804 

806 

$51,930 


Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 


$5,963 
455 

1,003 
340 

9,846 


$1,113 

1 

250 

13 

5,323 




Kentucky ... 6,953 

Louisiana 834 

Maryland 20,677 

Mississippi , 4,957 

Missouri 2,712 

North Carolina 6,010 
South Carolina 15,248 


4,436 


Massachusetts. . 
Michigan . 
New Hampshire 
New Jersey .... 

New York 

Oliio 


871 
406 
2,1 7T 
313 
969 
129 


Pennsylvania . . 
Rhode Island ... 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 


43,412 
9,440 

11,094 
2,216 

$502,irr~ 


Tennessee 

Texas 

A'irginia 


4,971 

849 

22,106 


1,611 

6 

10,000 


$101,9^4 


$27,613 



For colonizing free blacks in Liberia. 



180 



FKEB FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



DEATHS IN THE FREE AND IN THE SLAVE STATES— 1S50.* 



California 

Connecticut. . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massachusetts. 
Bliciiigan ... . 
N. Hampshire., 
New Jersey .. . 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania . 
Rhode Island. . 

Vermont 

Wisconsin 



Number of 
deaths. 



5,781 

11,619 

12,728 

2,044 

7,545 

19,414 

4,.520 

4,268 

6,467 

44,839 

28,949 

28,318 

2,241 

8,132 

2,884 



184,249 



Ratio to 

the Number 

living. 



64.13 
73.28 
77.65 
94.03 
77.29 
51.23 
88.19 
74.49 
75.70 
69.85 
68.41 
81.63 
65.83 
100.13 
105.82 



72.91 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky . . . . 
Louisiana ... . 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina 
South Carolina. 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Vh'ginia 



Number of 
deaths. 



9,084 

2,987 

1,209 

983 

9,920 

15,206 

11,948 

9,594 

8,711 

12,211 

10,207 

7,997 

11,759 

3,046 

19,053 



133,865 



Ratio to 

the Number 

living. 



84.94 

70.18 
75.71 
93.67 
91.93 
64.60 
42.85 
60.77 
69.93 
55.81 
85.12 
83.59 
85.34 
69.79 
74.61 



71.82 



T^^ B L E 3 O. 

FREE WHITE MALE PERSONS OVER FIFTEEN YEARS OF AGE ENGAGED IN 
AGRICULTURAL AND OTHER OUT-DOOR LABOR IN THE SLAVE STATES — 
1850. 



Number engaged 
in Agriculture. 



Number engaged 
in other out-door 
labor. 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kenaicky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi, 

Missouri 

North Carolina 
South Carolina. 
Tennessee .. .. 

Texas 

Virginia 



67,742 

28,436 

6,225 

5,472 

82,107 

110,119 
11,524 
24,672 
50,028 
64,292 • 
76,838 
37,612 

115,844 
24,987 
97,654 



803,052 



7,229 

5,596 

4,184 

2,598 

11,054 

26,.308 

13,827 

17,146 

5,823 

19,900 

21,876 

6,9»l 

16,795 

22,718 

83,928 



215,968 



74,971 
84,032 
10,409 
8,070 
93,161 

186,427 
25,351 
41,81S 
55,851 
84,192 
98,214 
44,603 

132,639 
47,700 

}ej,582 



ifti^yQm 



* For an explanation of this Table see the next three pages. 



FEEK FIGUKES AIsD SLATE. 181 

Too hot in the South, and too unhealthy there — white men ''can't 
stand it'' — negroes only can endure the heat of Southern climes I How 
often are our ears insulted with such wickedly false assertions as these ! 
In what degree of latitude — pray tell us — in what degree of latitude do 
the rays of the sun become too calorific for white men ? Certainly in 
no part of the United States, for in the extreme South we find a very 
large number of non-slaveholding whites over the age of fifteen, who 
derive their entire support from manual labor in the open fields. The 
sun, that brilliant bugbear of pro-slavery politicians, shone on more than 
one million of free white laborers — mostly agriculturists — in the slave 
States in 1850, exclusive of those engaged in commerce, trade, manufac- 
tures, the mechanic arts, and mining. Yet, notwithstanding all these 
instances of exposure to his wrath, we have had no intelligence what- 
ever of a single case of coup de soleil. Alabama is not too hot ; sixty- 
seven thousand white sons of toil till her soil. Mississippi is not too 
hot ; fifty-five thousand free white laborers are hopeful devotees of her 
out-door pursuits. Texas is not too hot; forty-seven thousand free 
white persons, males, over the age of fifteen, daily perform their rural 
vocations amidst her unsheltered air. 

It is stated on good authority that, in January, 1856, native ice, three 
inches thick, was found in Galveston Bay ; we have seen it ten inches 
thick in iSTorth Carolina, with the mercury in the thermometer at two 
degrees below zero. In January, 1857, while the snow was from three 
to five feet deep in many parts of Xorth Carolina, the thermometer indi- 
cated a degree of coldness seldom exceeded in any State in the Union — 
thirteen degrees below zero. The truth is, instead of its being too hot 
in the South for white men, it is too cold for negroes ; and we long to 
see the day arrive when the latter shall have entirely receded from their 
uncongenial homes in America, and given full and undivided place to 
the former. 

Too hot in the South for white men ! It is not too hot for white 
women. Time and again, in different counties in Xorth Carolina, have 
we seen the poor white wife of the poor white husband, following him 
In the harvest-field from morning till night, binding up the grain as 
it fell from his cradle. In the immediate neighborhood from which we 
hail, tliere are not less than thirty young women, non-slaveholding 
whites, between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five — some of whom are 
so well known to us that we could call them by name — who labor in 
the fields every summer ; often hiring themselves out during harvest- 
time, the very hottest season of the year, to bind wheat and oats — each, 
of them keeping up with the reaper; and this for the paltry considera- 
tion of twenty-five cents per day. 

That any respectable man — any man with a heart or a soul in his 
composition — can look upon these poor toiling white women without 



182 FREE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 

feeling indignaut at that accursed system of slavery whicJi has entailed 
on them the miseries of poverty, ignorance, and degradation, we shall 
not do ourself the violence to believe. If they and their husbands, 
and their sons and daughters, and brothers and sisters, are not righted 
in some of the more important particulars in which they have been 
wronged, tlie fault shall lie at other doors than our own. In their be- 
half, chiefly, have we written and compiled this work ; and until our 
object shall have been accomplished, or until life shall have been ex- 
tinguished, there shall be no abatement in our efforts to aid them in 
regaining the natural and inalienable prerogatives out of which they 
have been so craftily swindled. We want to see no more plowing, or 
hoeing, or raking, or grain-binding, by white women in the Southern 
States ; employment in cotton-mills and other factories would be far more 
profitable and congenial to them, and this they will have within a short 
period after slavery shall have been abolished. 

Too hot in the South for white men ! What is the testimony of 
reliable Southrons themselves? Says Cassius M. Clay, of Kentucky: 

" In tlie extreme South, at New Orleans, the laboring men— the stevedores and 
hackmen on the levee, where the heat is intensified by the proximity of the red 
brick buildings, are all white men, and they are in the full enjoyment of health. 
But how about cotton ? I am informed by a friend of mine — ^himself a slaveholder, 
and therefore good authority — that in northwestern Texas, among the German 
settlements, who, true to their national instincts, will not employ the labor of a 

slave they produce more cotton to the acre, and of a better quality, and selling 

at prices from a cent to a cent and a half a pound higher than that produced by 
slave labor." 

Says Gov. Ilammond, of South Carolina : 

" The steady heat of our summers is not so prostrating as the short, but frequent 
and sudden, bursts of Northern summers." 

In an extract, which may be found in our second chapter, and to 
which we respectfully refer the reader, it will be seen that this same 
South Carolinian, speaking of " not less than fifty thousand " non-slave- 
holding whites, says — " Most of these now follow agricultural pur- 
suits." 

Says Dr. Cartwright, of New Orleans: 

"Here in New Orleans, the larger part of the drudgery— work requiring expo- 
sure to the sun, as railroad-making, street-paving, dray-driving, ditching, and 
building, is performed by white people." 

To the statistical tables which show the number of deaths in the 
free and in the slave States in 1850, we would direct special attention. 
Those persons, particularly the propagandists of negro slavery, who, 
heretofore, have been so dreadfully exercised on account of what they 
have been pleased to term "the insalubrity of Southern climes," 
will there find something to allay their fearful apprehensions. A critical 
examination of said tables will disclose the fact that, in proportion to 
population, deaths occur more frequently in Massachusetts than in any 
Southern State except Louisiana ; mijre frequeutl/ in New York than 



FKEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 183 

in any of the Southern States, except Maryhiud, Missouri, Kentucky, 
Louisiana, and Texas ; more frequently in New Jersey, in Pennsylvania, 
and in Ohio, than in either Georgia, Florida, or Alabama. Leaving 
Wisconsin and Louisiana out of the account, and then comparing the 
bills of mortality in the remaining Northern States, with those in the 
remaining Southern States, we find the diflerence decidedly in favor of 
the latter : for, according to this calculation, while the ratio of deaths is 
as only one to 74.G0 of the living population in the Southern States, it 
is as one to 72.39 in the Northern. 
Says Dr. J. C. Nott, of Mobile : 

•' Heat, moisture, animal and vegetable matter, are said to be the elements 
which produce the diseases of the South, and yet tne testimony in proof of the 
health of the banks of the lower portion of the Mississippi River is too strong to be 
doubted,— not only the river itself, but also the numerous bayous which meander 
through Louisiana. Here is a perfectly flat alluvial country, covering several 
hundred miles, interspersed with interminable lakes, lagunes and jungles, and still 
we are infoi-med by Dr. Gartwrigiit, one of the most acute observers of the day, 
that this country is exempt from miasmatic disorders, and is extremely healthy. 
His assertion has been confirmed to me by hundreds of witnesses, and we know 
from our own observation, that the population present a robust and healthy 
appearance." 

But the best part is yet to come. In spite of all the blatant assertions 
of the oligarchy, that the climate of the South was arranged expressly 
for the negroes, and that the negroes were created expressly to inhabit 
it as the healthful servitors of other men, a carefully kept register of all 
the deaths that occurred in Charleston, South Carolina, for the space of 
six years, shows that, even in that locality which is generally regarded 
as so unhealthy, the annual mortality was much greater among the 
blacks, in proportion to population, than among the whites. Dr. Nott 
himself shall state the facts. He says : 

" The average mortality for the last six years in Charleston for all ages is 1 in 51, 
including all classes. Blacks alone 1 in 44 ; whites alone, 1 in 58— a very remarkable 
result, certainly. This mortality is perhaps not an unfair test, as the population 
during the last six years has been undisturbed by emigration and acclimated in a 
greater proportion than at any former period." 

Numerous other authorities might be cited in proof of the general 
healthiness of the climate south of Mason and Dixon's line. Of 127 
remarkable cases of American longevity, published in a recent edition 
of Blake's Biographical Dictionary, 68 deceased centenarians are credited 
to the Southern States, and 59 to the Northern — the list being headed 
with Betsey Trantham, of Tennessee — a white woman, who died in 
1834, at the extraordinarily advanced age of 154 years. 



184 



FKEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



TJ^JBLE 31. 



NATIVES OF THE SLAVE STATES IN THE FREE STATES, AND NATIVES OF THE 
FREE STATES IN THE SLAVE STATES.— 1850. 



Free States. 


Niitivcs of the 
Slave States. 


Slave States. 


Natives of the 
Free States. 




24,055 

1,390 

144,809 

176,581 

31,392 

458 

2,980 

3,6-34 

215 

4,110 

12,625 

152,319 

47,180 

982 

140 

6,358 




4,947 
7,965 








Delaware 

Florida 


6,996 




1,718 






4,249 






31,340 






14,567 




Maryland 


23,815 




4,517 






55,664 


New-York 




2,167 


Ohio 




2,427 




Tennessee 

Texas 


6,571 


Rhode Island 


9,982 






2S,999 


Wisconsin . . 


Total 




Total 


609,223 


205,924 







This last table, compiled fi-om tliell6tli page of the Compendium of 
the Seventh Census, shows, in a most lucid and startling manner, how 
negroes, slavery and slaveholders are driving the native non-slavehold- 
ing whites away from their homes, and keeping at a distance other 
decent people. From the South the tide of emigration still flows in a 
westerly and northwesterly direction, and so it will continue to do 
until slavery is abolished. 

TA-BL.E! 33. 

VALUE OP THE SLAVES AT $400 PER HEAD.— 1850.* 



States. 



Value of the i^laves at S400 
per head. 



Value of Real and Personal 
Estate, less the value of 
slaves at SJOO per head. 



Alabama 

Arkansas 

Delaware 

Florida ' 

Georgia 

Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mis.-issippi 

Missouri 

North Carolina. 
South Carolina. . 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Virginia 



$137,137,600 

18,8411,000 

916,000 

15,724,000 

152,672,8(10 
84,o92,4<»l) 
97,92^,61)11 
36,14T,-J(m 

123,9.01,2(111 
34.908.8(10 

115,419.2ii0 

153,993,611(1 
95,783,61 iO 
23,264,4110 

189,011,200 



$81,066,732 

21,001,025 

17,939,863 

7,474,734 

182,752,914 

217,2.36,056 

136,075,164 

183.07(1,164 

105,000,(it!0 

lf>2,27S.90< 

111,381,272 

184,264,094 

111,671,104 

32,097,940 

202,634,638 



$1,280,145,6(10 



$1,655,945,137 



* It is intended that this table shall be considered in connection with table No., 10. 



FEEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



185 



To Dr. G. Bailey, editor of the National Era, Washington City, D. C, 
we are indebted for the following useful and interesting statistics, to 
which some of our readers will doubtless have frequent occasion to refer : 



PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES. 



March 4, 


17S9 


" 8, 1T9T 


March 4, 


1T9T 


" 3 


ISOl 


March 4, 


ISOl 


" 3, 


1S09 


March 4, 


ISUO 


" 3 


ISIT 


March 4, 


1817 


" 3 


1S25 


March 4, 


1S25 


" s, 


1S29 


March 4, 


1S29 


" 3 


1S37 



!■ George Washiagton, Virginia. 
\ John Adams, Massachusetts. 
[ Thomas Jefferson, Virginia, 
i James Madison, Virginia. 
!• James Monroe, Virginia. 
[■ John Q. Adams, Mass. 
i Andrew Jackson, Tennessee. 



March 4, 1S37 ) Martin Van Luren, New York. 
""''"^ I' ^1^ j- William H. Harrison, Ohio. 
March 4, 1S45 i james K. Polli, Tennessee. 
March 4, 1S49 { 2achary Taylor, Louisiana. 
*^^' '^ 1; 1857 [ Franklin Pierce, N. H. 
^^""l?^ I' 111 } J'^'^es Buchanan, Penn. 



At the close of the term for -which Mr. Buchanan is elected, it will have been 
seventy-two j'ears since the organization of the present government. 

In that period, there have been eighteen elections for President, the candidates 
chosen in twelve of them being Southern men and slaveholders, in six of them 
Northern men and non-slaveholders. 

No Northern man has ever been reelected, but five Southern men have been thus 
honored. 

Gen. Harrison, of Ohio, died one month after his inauguration. Gen. Taylor, of 
Louisiana, about four months after his inauguration. In the former case, John 
Tyler, of Virginia, became acting President, in the latter, Millard Fillmore of New 
York. 

Of the seventy-two years, closing with Mr. Buchanan's term, should he live it 
out. Southern men and slaveholders have occupied the Presidential chair forty- 
eight years and three months, or a little more than two-thirds of the time. 

THE SUPEEME COURT. 

The judicial districts are organized so as to give five judges to the slave States, 
and four to the free, although the population, wealth and business of the latter are 
far in advance of those of the former. The arrangement affords, however, an ex- 
cuse for constituting the Supreme Court, with a majority of judges from the slave- 
holding States. 

MEMBEKS. 



Chief Justice— R. B. Taney, Maryland. 
Associate Justice— J. M. Wayne, Georgia. 

" " John Catron, Tennessee. 

" " P. V. Daniel, Virginia. 

" " John A. Campbell, Ala. 

" " John McLean, Ohio. 



Associate Justice— S. Nelson, New York. 

" " R. C. Grier, Pennsylvania. 

" " Nathan Clifford, Maine. 

Reporter, B. C. Howard, Maryland. 
Clerk, W. T. Carroll, D. C. 



SECRETARIES OF STATE. 

The highest office in the Cabinet is that of Secretary of State, who has under his 
charge the foreign relations of the country. Since the year 1789, there have been 
twenty-three appointments to the office— fourteen from slave States, mne from free. 
Or, counting by years, the post has been filled by Southern men and slaveholders 
very nearly forty years out of sixty-nine as follows : 



Appointed. 
Sept. 26, 17S9, Thomas Jefferson, Virginia. 
Jan. 2, )794, E. Randolph, A'irginia. 
Dec. 10, 1795, T. Pickering, Massachusetts. 
May 13, ISOO, J. Marshall, Virginia. 
March 5, 1801, James Madison, Virginia. 
March 6, 1809, R. Smitli, Maryland. 
April 2, 1811, James Monroe, Virginia. 
Feb. 28, 1815, " 

March 5, 1S15, J. Q. Adams, Massachusetts. 
March 7, 1825, Henry Clay, Kentucky. 
March 6,1829, Martin Van Buren, New York. 
May 24, 1831, E. Livingston, Louisiana. 



Appointed. 
May 29, 1833, Louis McLane, Delaware. 
June 27, 18-34, J. Forsyth, Georgia. 
March 5, 1S41, Daniel Webster, Mass. 
July 24, 1S43, A. P. Upshur, Virginia. 
March 6, 1S44, J. C. Calhoun, South Carolina 
March 5, 1845, James Buchanan, Penn. 
March 7, 1849, J. M. Clayton, Delaware. 
July 20, 1850, Daniel Webster, Mass. 
Dec. 9, 1851, E. Everett, Massachusetts. 
March 5, 1853, AV. L. Marcy, New York. 
March 6, 1857, Lewis Cass, Michigan. 



186 



FREE FIGURES AND SLAVE 



PRESIDENTS PRO TEM. OF THE SEXATE. 

Since the year 1S09, every President jjro tern, of the Senate of the United States 
has been a Southern man and slaveholder, with the exception of Samuel L. South- 
ard of \ew Jersey, who held the olEce lor a very short time, and Mr. Bright, of 
Indiana^ who has held it for one ortv/o sessions, we believe, having been elected, 
however, as a known adherent of the slave interest, believed to be interested in 
slave '-ijroperty." 



SPEAKERS OF THE HOITSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. 



April, 17S9 
March 3, 1791 
Oct. 24, 1791 
March 2, 1793 
Dec. 2, 1793 
March 3, 1795 
Dec. 7, 1795 
March 3, 1797 
Mav 15, 1797 
March 3, 1799 
Dec. 2, 1799 
March 3, IsOl 
Dec. 7, ISOl 
March 3, 1S07 
Oct. 2(3, tS07 
March 3, ISU 
March 4, 1811 
Jau. 19, 1S14 
Jan. 19, 1S14 
March 2, 1815 
Dec. 4, ISlo 
Nor. 13, 1S20 
Nov. Id, 1S20 
March 3, 1^21 
Dec. 8, 1821 
March 3, is23 
Dec. 1, 1S23 
March .3, 1825 



If. a. Muhlenberg, Penn. 
i J. Trumbull, Connecticut. 
i F. A. Muhlenberg, Penn. 
[•Jonathan Dayton, N. J. 



Dec. 5, 1825 
March 3, 1S27 
Dec. 3, 1827 
June 2, 1834 
June 2, 1834 
March 3, 1835 
Dec. 7, 18.35 
March 3, 1839 
Dec. 16,1839 
March 3, 1841 
May 31, 1841 
March 8, 1343 
Dec. 4, 1843 
March 3, 1845 
Dec. 1, 1845 
Marcli 8, 1847 
Dec. 6, 1847 
March 3, 1849 
Dec. 22, 1849 
March 3, 1851 
Dec. 1, 1851 
March 3, 1853 
Dec. 1, 1S53 
March 8, 1855 
Feb. 28, 1806 
March 8, 1857 
Dec. 7. 1857 
March 3, 1859 



POSTMASTERS-GENEEAL. 

Appointed- 



[ Theodore Sedgwick, Mass. 

i Nathaniel Macon, N. C. 

i J. B. Varnum, Massachusetts. 

i- Henry Clay, Kentuclsy. 

> Langdon Cheves, S. C. 

[■ Ileni-y Clay, Kentucky. 

I J. W. Taylor, New York. 

!P. B. Barbour, Virginia. 
Henry Clay, Kentucky. 



[ J. W. Taylor, New York. 
> A. Stevenson, Virginia. 
[■John Bell, Tennessee. 
[■James K. Polk, Tennessee. 
i R. M. T. Hunter, Virginia, 
i John White, Tennessee, 
i J. W. Jones, Virginia. 
!■ J. W. Davis, Indiana. 
t R. C. 'Wmthrop, Mass. 
i Howell Cobb, Georgia. 
,:;q \ lAiui Boyd, Kentucky. 



i Nathaniel 

i James L. Orr, S. C. 



[Nathaniel P. Banks, Mass. 



Appointed — 
Sept. 26, 1789, S. Osgood, Massachusetts. 
Aug. 12, 1791, T. Pickering, Massachusetts 
Feb. 25, 1795, J. Habersham, Georgia. 
Nov. 28. 1801, G. Granger, Connecticut. 
March 17', 1814, R J. Meigs, Ohio. 
June 25, 1823, John McLean, Ohio. 
March 9, 1829, W. T. Barry, Kentucky. 
May 1, 1835, A. Kendall, Kentucky. 
May IS, 1840, J. TtL Niles, Connecticut. 

Sectionalism does not seem to have had much to do with this department or with 
that of the interior, created in 1848-49, 

SECRETARIES OF THE INTERIOR. 



March 6, 1841, F. Granger, New York. 
Sept. 13, 1841, C. A. AVickliffe, Kentucky. 
March 5, 1845, C. Jolinson, Tennessee. 
March 7, 1S49, J. Collamer, Vermont. 
July 20, 1850, N. K. Hall, New York. 
Aug. 31, 1S52, S. D. Hubbard, Connecticut. 
March 5, 18.!)3, J. Campbell, Pennsylvania. 
March 6, 1857, Aaron V. Brown, Tennessee. 



Appointed — 
March 7, 1S49, T. Ewing, Ohio. 
July 20, 1850, J. A. Pearce, Maryland. 
Aug. 15, 1850, T. M. T. McKennon, Pa. 



Appointed — 
Sept. 12, 1-50, A. H. H. Stuart, Virginia. 
March 5, 1S53, R. McClelland, Michigan. 
March 6, 1857, Jacob Thompson, Mississippi. 



ATTORNEYS-GEXERAL. 



Appointed — 
}^ept. 26, 1789, 
June 27, 1794, 
Dec. 10, 179.^ 
Feb. 20, 1^-00, 
March 5, 1-0 1, 
March 2, l-o.'>, 
Dec. 23, 1M)5, 
Jan. 2ii, 1S07, 
Dec. 11,1,'<11, 
Feb. 10, TSU, 
Nov. 13, 1817, 
March 9, 1829, 
July 20,1831, 



E. Randolph, Virginia. 

W B;adford, Pennsylvania. 

C. I.ec, Virginia. 

T. Pavsons, Massachusetts. 

I>. Lincoln, Ma^-sachusetts. 

It. .Siiiith, >L'iryIiind. 

J. Breckinridge, Kentucky. 

C. A. Rodney, Pennsylvania. 

W. Pinkney, Maryland. 

J{. Rush, Peiuisylvania. 

W. AVirt, Virginia. 

J. McPherson Berrien, Georgia. 

Roger B. Taney, Maryland. 



Appointed — 
Nov. 15, 1833, 
July 7, 1838, 
Jan. 10, 1840, 
March 5, 1841, 
Sept. 13, 1841, 
July 1, 184.3, 
March 6, 1845, 
Oct. 17, 1846, 
June 21, 1848, 
March 7, 1849, 
July 20, 1850, 
March 5, 18.5.3, 
March 6, 1857, 



B. F. Butler, New York. 
F. Grundy, Tennessee. 

H. D. Gilpin, Pennsylvania. 

J. J. Ciittenden, Kentucky. 

11. S. Legare, .'^outh Carolina. 

John Nelson, Maryland. 

J. Y. Mason, Virginia. 

N. Cliflord, Maine. 

Isaac Toucey, Connecticut. 

R. Johnson, Maryland. 

J. J. Crittenden, Kentucky. 

C. Cushing, Massachusetts. 
Jeremiah S. Black, Pa. 



FREE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



187 



SECRETARIES OF THE TREASURY. 

Tlie post of Secretary of the Treasury, althougli one of great importance, requires 
financial abilities of a high order, which are more frequently found in the North 
than in the South, and affords little opportunity for influencing general politics, or 
the questions springing out of slaver}-. We need not, therefore, be surprised to 
learn that Northern men have been allowed to discharge its duties some forty-eight 
years out of sixty-nine, as follows : 

Appointed — Appointed — 

Sept. 11, 17^9, A. Hamilton, New York. Sept. 23, 1S.33, 

Feb. 3, 1795, 0. AVolcott, Connecticut. June 27, ISU, 

Dec. 81, ISOO, S. De.xter, Massachusetts. March 5, 1S41, 

May 14, ISOl, A. Gallatin, Pennsylvania. Sept. 13, 1^41, 

Feb. 9. 1814, (i. AV. Campbell, Tennessee. March 3, 1^4;^, 

Oct.. 6, 1S14, A. J. Dallas, Peunsvlvania. .lune 15, 1S44, 

Oct. 22, ISIG, W. 11. Crawford, Georgia. March 5, 1845, 

March 7, 1S25, R. Kush, Pennsylvania. March 7, 1849, 

March 6, 1829, S. D. Inpham, Pennsylvania. June 20, 1850, 

Aug. 8, 18.31, L. McLane, Delaware. JIarch 5 1853, 

May 29, 1833, W. J. Duane, Pennsylvania. March 6, 1857, 



Roger B. Taney, Maryland. 

L. M'oodbury, New Hampshire. 

Thomas Ewing, Ohio. 

W. Forward, Pennsylvania. 

•T. C. Spencer, New York. 

G. M. Bibb, Kentucky. 

R. J. Walker. Mississippi. 

W. M. Meredith, Pennsylvania. 

Thomas Corwiu, Ohio. 

James Guthrie, Kentucky. 

Howell Cobb, Georgia. 



SECEETAEIES OF "WAR AND THE NAVY. 

The slaveholders, since March 8th, 1841, a period of nearly eighteen years, have 
taken almost exclusive supervision of the navy, Northern men having occupied the 
Secretaryship only six years. Nor has any Northern man been Secretary of War 
since 184'J. Considering that nearly all the shipping belongs to the free States, 
which also supply the seamen, it does seem remarkable that slaveholders should 
have monopolized for the last eighteen years the control of the navy. 



Appointed — 
Sept. 12, 1789, 
Jan. 2, 1795, 
Jan. 27, 1796, 
Mav 7, ISOO, 
May 13, 1800, 
Feb. 3, 1801, 
JIarch 5, ISOl, 
March 7, 1802, 
Jan. 1.3, 1813, 
Sept. 27, 1814, 
March 3, 1815, 
March .5, 1S17, 
April 7, 1817, 
Oct. S, 1817, 
March 7, 1825, 
Slay 2G, 1828 



Henry Knox, Massachusetts. 
T. Pickering, Massachusetts. 
J. McHenry, Maryland. 
J. Marshall, Virginia. 
S. Dexter, Massachusetts. 
R. Griswold, Connecticut. 
H. Dearborn, Massachusetts. 
W. Eustis, JIassachusetts. 
J. Armstrong, New York. 
James Monroe, Virginia. 
AV. H. Ciawford, Georgia. 
J. Shelby, Kentucky. 
G. Graham, Virginia. 
J. C. Calhoun, South Carolina. 
J. Barbour, Virginia. 
P. B. Porter, Pennsylvania. 



SECRETARIES OF AVAR. 
Appointed — 
JIarch 9, 1829, 
Aug. 1, 1831, 
March 3, 1S37, 
March 7, 18.37, 
March 5, 1841, 
Sept. 13, 1841, 
Oct. 12, 1841, 
March S, 1843, 
Feb. 15, 1844, 
March 5, 1845, 
March 7, 1849, 
July 20, 1850, 
Aug. 15, 1850, 
March 5, IS.'io, 
March 6, 1857, 



J. H, Eaton, Tennessee. 
Lewis Cass, Ohio. 

B. F. Butler, New York. 

J. R. Poinsett, South Carolina. 
James Bell, Tennessee. 
John McLean, Ohio. 
J. C. Spencer, New York. 
J. AV. Porter, Pennsylvania. 
AV. AAilkins, Pennsylvania. 
AA'illiam L. Marcy, New York. 
G. AA'. Crawford, Georgia. 
E. Bates, Missouri. 

C. M. Conrad, Louisiana. 
Jefferson Davis, Mississippi. 
John B. Floyd, Virginia. 



Appointed — 
May 3, 1793, 
May 21, 1798, 
July 15, 1801, 
May 3, 1805, 
March 7, ISdl), 
Jan. 12, 1S13, 
Dec. 17, 1814, 
Nov. 9, 1818, 
Sept. 1, 1823, 
Sept. 16, 1823, 
March 9, 1829, 
May 2.3, 1831, 
June 80, 1S34, 



SECEETAEIES OF THE NAVY. 
Appointed — 
June 20, 1S3S, 
March 5, Isll, 
Sept. 13, 18-n, 
July 24, 1843, 
Feb. 12, 1844, 
JIarch 14, 1844, 
JIarch 10, 1845, 
Sept. 9, 1846, 
JIarch 7, 1S49, 
Julv 20, 1S50, 
July 22, 18.'52, 
March 3, 185-3, 
JIarch 6, 1S57, 



G. Cabot, JIassachusetts. 
B. Stoddart, JIassachusetts. 
R. Sniitli, JIarvland. 
.1. Crowninshield, JIass. 
P. Hamilton, South Carolina. 
\V. Jones, Pennsylvania 
B. AV. Crowninshield, JIass. 
Smith Thompson, New A'ork. 
John Rogers, JIassachusetts. 
S. L. Southard, New Jersey. 
John Branch, North Carolina. 
L. AVoodbury, New Hampshire. 
JI. Dickerson, New Jersey. 



J. K. Paulding, New York. 
G. F. Badger, North Carolina. 
A. P. Upshur, A'irginia. 
D. Henshaw, JIassachusetts. 
T. AV. Gilmer, A'irginia. 
James Y. JIason, A'irginia. 
G. Bancroft, JIassachusetts. 
James Y. JIason, A'irginia. 
AA'. B. Preston, A'irginia. 
W. A. Graham, N. Carolina. 
J. P. Kennedy, Maryland. 
J. C. Dobbin, N. Carolina. 
Isaac Toucey, Connecticut. 



RECAPITULATION. 



Presidency. — Southern men and slaveholders, 43 years 3 months ; Northern men, 
23 years 9 months. 

Pro Tern. Presidency of the Senate. — Since 1809, held by Southern men and 
slaveholders, except for three or four sessions by Northern men. 



188 



FREE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 



Speakership of the House. — Filled by Southern men and slaveliolers forty-five 
years, Northern men, twenty-five. 

Supreme Court — A majority of the Judges, including Chief-Justice, southern men 
and slaveholders. 

Secretaryship of State.— Filled by southern men and slaveholders forty years ; 
northern, twenty-nine. 

Attorney Generalship.— FiWed by southern men and slaveholders forty-two years ; 
northern men, twenty-seven. 

• War and A^ayy.— Secretaryship of the Navy, southern men and slaveholders, the 
last eighteen years, with an interval of six years. 

"WILLIAM IIEXRT HUELBUT, 

Of South Carolina, a gentleman of enviable literary attainments, and 
one from whom we may expect a continuation of good service in the 
eminently holy crusade now going on against slavery and the devil, fur- 
nished not long since, to tlie Ediiiburgh Hevietc, in the course of a long 
and highly interesting article, the following summary of oligarchal usur- 
pations — showing that slaveholders have occupied the principal posts of 
the government nearly two-thirds of the time : 

Presidents 11 out of 16 

Judges of the Supreme Court 17 out of 28 

Attorneys-General 14 out of 19 

Presidents of the Senate 61 out of 77 

Speakers of the House 21 out of 33 

Foreign Ministers 80 out of 13i 

As a matter of general interest, and as showing that, while there have 
been but eleven non-slaveholders directly before the people as candidates 
for the Presidency, there have been at least sixteen slaveholders who 
were willing to serve their country in the capacity of chief magistrate 
the following table may be here introduced : 

EESULT OF THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES FEOM 

1796 TO 1856. 

Name of Candidate. Elect'l vote. 

Andrew Jackson 219 

Henry Clay 49 

John Floyd 11 

William Wirt 7 

Martin Van Buren 170 

William H. Harrison 73 

Hugh L.White 26 

Willie P. Mangum 11 

Daniel Webster 14 

William H. Harrison 234 

Martin Van Buren 60 

James K. Polk 170 

Henry Clay 105 

Zachary Taylor 163 



Year. 
1796 

1800 

1804 

1808 

1812 

1816 

1820 

1824 

1828 



Name of Candidate. Elect'l vote 

( John Adams 71 

I Thomas Jefferson 68 

] Thomas Jefferson 73 

/ John Adams 64 

Thomas Jefferson 162 

Charles C. Piuckney 14 

James Madison 128 

Charles C. Pinckney 45 

James Madison 122 

De Witt Clinton 89 

James Monroe 183 

^RufusKing 34 

j James Monroe 218 

j No opposition but one vote 

r Andrew Jackson* 99 

I John Q. Adams 84 

1 W. H. Crawford 41 

[HenryClay 37 

j Andrew Jackson 178 

I John Q. Adams 83 



. Year. 
1832- 

1836- 

1840 
1844 
1848 
1852 
1856 



Lewis Cass. 

Franklin Pierce 

General Winfield Scott.. . 

James Buchanan 

John C. Fremont 

' Millard Fillmore 



127 

254 

42 

174 

114 

8 



AID FOE KANSAS. 

As a sort of accompaniment to many of the preceding tables, we will 



• No choics by the people ; John Q. Adams elected by the House of Representatives. 



FREE FfGUKES AND SLAVE. 189 

here introduce a few items wiiich ■will more fully ilhu^trate the liberality 
of freedom and the niggardliness of slavery. 

From an editorial article that appeared in the Eichmond (Va.,) Dis- 
patch, in July, 1856, bewailing the close-fistedness of slavery, we make 
the following extract : 

" Gerrit Smith, the Abolitionist, has just pledged himself to give $1,500 a month 
for the next twelve months to aid in establishing freedom in Kansas. lie gave, but 
a short time since, at the Kansas relief meeting in Albany, $3,000. Prior to that, 
he had sent about SI, 000 to the Boston Emigrant Committee. Out of his own 
funds, he subsequently equipped a JIadison county company, of one hundred picked 
men, and paid their expenses to Kansas. At Syracuse he subscribed $10,000 for 
Abolition purposes, so that his entire contributions amount to at least $40,000." 

Under date of August 9, 1856, an Eastern paper informs us that 

" The sum of $500 was contributed at a meeting at New Bedford on Monday 
evening, to make Kansas free. The following sums have been contributed for the 
same purpose: $2,000 in Taunton: $600 inEavnham: $S00 in Clinton: $300 in 
Danbury, Ct, In Wisconsin, $2,500 at Janesvi'lle : $500 at Dalton ; $500 at the 
Women's Aid Meeting in Chicago ; $2,000 in Eockford, 111." 

A telegraphic dispatch, dated Boston, January 2, 1857, says : 

" The Secretary of the Kansas Aid Committee acknowledges the receipt of 

$42,678." 

Exclusive of the amounts above, the readers of the E"ew York Trib- 
une contributed at least $30,000 for the purpose of securing Kansas to 
Freedom; and with the same object in view, other individuals and socie- 
ties, as occasion required, made large contributions, of which we failed 
to keep a memorandum. The Legislature of Vermont appropriated 
$20,000 ; and other free state legislatures were prepared to appropriate 
millions, if necessary. Free men had determined that Kansas should be 
free, and free it is, and will ever so remain. All honor to the immortal 
patriots who saved her from the death-grasp of slavery ! 
■ 1^0 w let US see how Slavery rewarded the poor, ignorant, deluded, 
and degraded mortals — swaggering lickspittles — who labored so hard to 
gain for it a " local habitation and a name " in the disputed territory. 
One U. B. Atchison, chairman of the Executive Committee of Border 
Euffians, shall tell us all about it. Over date of October 13th, 1856, he 
says: 

" Up to this moment, from all the States except Missouri, we have only received 
the following sums, and through the following persons : 

A. W. Jones, Houston, Miss. • $152 

H. D. Clayton, Eufala, Ala 500 

Capt. Deedrick, South Carolina 500 

$1,152" 

On this subject further comment is unnecessary. 

Numerous other contrasts, equally disproportionate, might be drawn 
between the vigor and muniticence of Freedom and the impotence and 
stinginess of Slavery. We will, however, in addition to the above, 
advert to only a single in?tance. During the latter part of the summer 



190 FKEE FIGURES AND SLATE. 

of 1855, the citizens of the despicable little slave-towns of Norfolk and 
Portsmouth, in Virginia, were sorely plagued with yellow fever. Many 
of them fell victims to the disease, and most of those who survived, 
and who were not too imwell to travel, left their homes horror-stricken 
and dejected. To the honor of mankind in general, and to the glory 
of freemen in particular, contributions in money, provisions, clothing, 
and other valuable supplies, poured in from all parts of tbe country for 
the relief of the sufferers. Portsmouth alone, according to the report 
of her relief association, received $42,547 in cash from the free States, 
and only $12,182 in cash from all the slave States, exclusive of Virginia, 
within whose borders the malady prevailed. Including Virginia, the 
sum total of all the slave State contributions amounted to only $33,398. 
Well did the Kichmond Examiner remark at the time — " we fear that 
generosity of Virginians is but a figure of speech." Slavery ! thy name 
is shame ! 

The following statistics of Congressional representation, which we 
transcribe from " Eeynolds' Political Map of the United States," pub- 
lished in 1856, desei-ve to be carefully studied : 

UNITED STATES SENATE. 

Sixteen free States, witli a white population of 13,238,G70 have thirty-two 
Senators. 

Fifteen slave States, with a white population of 6,186,477, have thirty Senators. 

So that 413,708 free men of the North enjoy but the same political privileges in 
the United States Senate as is given to 206,215 slave propagandists. 

nOUSE OF EEPRESENTATIVES. 

The free States have a total of 144 members. 
The slave States have a total of 90 members. 

One free State Representative represents 91,935 white men and women. 
One slave State Representative represents 68,725 white men and women. 
Slave Representation gives to slavery an advantage over freedom of thirty votes 
in the House of Representatives. 

CUSTOM HOUSE RECEIPTS — 1854. 

Free States $60,010,489 

Slave States 5,136,969 

Balance in favor of the Free States $54,873,520 

A contrast quite distinguishable ! 

That the apologists of slavery cannot excuse the shame and the shab- 
biness of themselves and their country, as we liave frequently heard 
them attempt to do, by falsely asserting that the North has enjoyed 
over the South the advantages of priority of settlement, will fully 
appear from the following table : 



FEEE FIGUEES AND SLAVE. 



191 



FRKK STATES. 

1614 New York first settled by the Dutch. 
1620 Massachusetts settled by the Puritans. 

1623 New Hampshire settled by the Puritans. 

1624 New Jersey settled by the Dutch. 

1635 Connecticut settled by the Puritans. 

1636 Rhoile Island settled by Roger Williams. 
16S2 Pennsylvania settled by William Peun. 
1791 Vermont admitted into the Union. 

1802 Oliio admitted into the Union. 
1S16 Iiuliana admitted into the Union. 
ISIS Illinois admitted into the Union. 
1S20 Maine admitted into the Union. 
1830 Michigan admitted into the Union. 
1840 Iowa admitted into the Union. 
1848 Wisconsin admitted into the Union. 
1850 California admitted into the Union. 



SLAVE STATES. 

1607 Virginia first settled by the English. 
1627 Delaware settled by the Swedes and Fins. 
1635 Maryland settled by Irish Catholics. 
1650 North Carolina settled by the English. 
1670 South Carolina settled by the Huguenots. 
1733 Georgia settled by Gen. Oglethorpe. 
1782 Kentucky admitted into the Union. 
1796 Tennessee admitted into tlie Union. 
ISIl Louisiana admitted into the Union. 
1S17 Mississippi admitted into the Union. 
1819 Alabama admitted into the Union. 
1821 Missouri admitted into the Union. 
1836 Arkansas admitted into the Union. 

1845 Florida admitted into the Union. 

1846 Texas admitted into the Union. 



In tlie course of an exceedingly interesting article on the early settle- 
ments in America, E. K. Browne, formerly editor and proprietor of the 
San Francisco Evening Journal^ says : 

" Many people seem to think that the Pilgrim Fathers were the first who settled 
upon our shores, and therefore that they ought to be entitled, in a particular man- 
ner, to our remembrance and esteem. 

" This is not the case, and we herewith present to our readers a list of settle- 
ments made in the present United States, prior to that of Plymouth : 

1564. A Colony of French Protestants under Eibault, settled in Florida. 

156.5. St. Augustine* founded by Pedro Melendez. 

1584. Sir Walter Ealeigh obtains a patent and sends two vessels to the American 
coast, which receives the name of Virginia. 

1607. The first effectual settlement made at Jamestown, Va., by the London 
Company. 

1614. A fort erected by the Dutch upon the site of New York. 

1615. Fort Orange built near the site of Albany, N. Y. 
1019. The first General Assembly called in Virginia. 
1620, The Pilgrims land on Plymouth Kock." 

FREEDOM AND SLAVERY AT THE FAIR. 
WHAT FREEDOM DID. 

At an Agricultural Fair held at Watertown, in the State of Few 
York, on the 2d day of October, 1856, two hundred and twenty pre- 
miums, ranging from three to fifty dollars each, were awarded to suc- 
cessful competitors — the aggregate amount of said premiums being 
$2,396, or an average of $10 89 each. From the proceedings of the 
Awarding Committee we make the following extracts : 

Best Team of Oxen, Hiram Converse $50 00 

Best Horse Colt, George Parish 25 00 

Best Filly, J. Staplin 20 00 

Best Brood Mare, A. Blunt 25 00 

Best Bull, Wm. Johnson 25 00 

Best Heifer, A.M. Eogers 20 00 

Best Cow, C. Baker 25 00 

Best Stall-fed Beef, J. SV. Taylor 10 00 

Best sample Wheat, Wm. Ottley 5 00 

Best sample Flaxseed, H. Weir 3 00 

Best sample Timothy Seed, E. S. Hayward 3 00 

Best sample Sweet Corn, L. Marshall 3 00 

Aggregate amount of twelve premiums $214 00 

An average of $17 83 each. 



* The oldest town in the United States. 



192 FKEE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 

WHAT 8LATEEY DID. 

At the Kowan County Agricultural Fair, held at Mineral Springs, in 

North Carolina, on 13th day of November^ 1856, thirty premiums 

ranging from twenty-five cents to two dollars each, were awarded to 

successful competitors — the aggregate amount of said premiums being 

$42 00, or an average of $1 40 each. From the proceedings of the 

Awarding Committee we make the following extracts : 

Best pair Match Horses, E. AV. GrifiSth $2 00 

Best Horse Colt, T. A. Burke 2 00 

Best Filly, James Cowan 2 00 

Best Brood Mare, M. W. Goodman 2 00 

Best Bull, J. F. McCorkle 2 00 

Best Heifer, J. F. McCorkle 2 00 

Best Cow, T. A. Burke 2 00 

Best Stall-fed Beef, S. D. Rankin 1 00 

Best Sample Wheat, M W . Goodman 60 

Best Lot Beets, J. J. Summerell 25 

Best Lot Turnips, Thomas Barber 25 

, Best Lot Cabbage, Thomas Hyde 25 

Aggregate amount of twelve premiums $16 25 

An average of $1 36 each. 

Besides the two hundred and twenty premiums, amounting in the 
aggregate to $2,396, Freedom granted several diplomas and silver medals ; 
besides the thirty premiums amounting in the aggregate to $42, Slavery 
granted none — nothing. While examining these figures, it should be 
recollected that agriculture is the peculiar province of the slave States. 
If commerce or manufactures had been the subject of the fair, the 
result might have shown even a greater disproportion in favor of Free- 
dom, and yet there would have been some excuse for Slavery, for it 
makes no pretensions to either the one or the other ; but as agriculture 
was the subject. Slavery can have no excuse whatever, but must bear aU 
the shame of its niggardly and revolting impotence ; this it must do for 
the reason that agriculture is its special and almost only pursuit. 

The Keports of the Comptrollers of the States of New York and 
North Carolina, for the year 1856, are now before us. From each 
report we have gleaned a single item, which, when compared, the one 
with the other, speaks volumes in favor of Freedom and against Slavery. 
We refer to the average value per acre of lands in the two States ; let 
slaveholders read, reflect, and repent. 

In 1856, there were assessed for taxation in tlie State of 

NEW YOKK, 

Acres of land 30,080,000 

Valued at $1,112,133,136 

Average value per acre $36 97 

In 1856, there were assessed for taxation in the State of 

NOETH CAROLINA, 

Acres of land 32.450,560 

Valued at $98,800,636 

Average value per acre $3 06 



FREE FIGURES AND SLAVE. 193 

It is difficult for us to make any remarks on the official facts above. 
Our indignation is struck almost dumb at this astounding and revolting 
display of the awful wreck that slavery is leaving behind it in the 
South. We will, however, go into a calculation for the purpose of 
ascertaining as nearly as possible, in this one particular, how much 
North Carolina has lost by the retention of slavery. As we have 
already seen, the average value per acre of land in the State of Ifew 
York is $36 97 ; in ISTorth Carolina it is only $3 06 ; why is it so much 
less, or even any less, in the latter than in the former ? The answer is. 
Slavery. In soil, in climate, in minerals, in water-power for manufac- 
tural purposes, and in area of territory. North Carolina has the advan- 
tage of New York, and, with the exception of slavery, no plausible 
reason can possiblybe assigned why land should not be at least as valu- 
able in the valley of the Yadkin as it is along the banks of the Genesee. 

The difference between $36 97 and $3 06 is $33 91, which, multiplied 
by the whole number of acres of land in North Carolina, will show, in 
this one particular, the enormous loss that freedom has sustained on ac- 
count of slavery in the Old North State. Thus : 

32,450,560 acres a $38 91 $1,100,398,489, 

Let it be indelibly impressed on the mind, however, that this amount, 
large as it is, is only a moiety of the sum that it has cost to maintain 
slavery in North Carolina. From time to time, hundreds upon hundreds 
of millions of dollars have left the State, either in search of profitable, 
permanent investment abroad, or in the shape of profits to Northern 
merchants and manufacturers, who have become the moneyed aristocracy 
of the country by supplying to the South such articles of necessity, util- 
ity, and adornment, as would have been produced at home but for the 
pernicious presence of the peculiar institution. 

A reward of eleven hundred million of dollars is offered for the con- 
version of the lands of North Carolina into free soil. The lands them- 
selves, desolate and impoverished under the fatal foot of slavery, offer the 
reward. How, then, can it be made to appear that the abolition of 
slavery in North Cai'olina, and, indeed, throughout all the Southern 
States — for slavery is exceedingly inimical to them all — is not demanded 
by every consideration of justice, prudence, and good sense? In 1850, 
the total value of all the slaves of the State at the rate of four hundred 
dollars per head, amounted to less than one hundred and sixteen million 
of dollars. Is the sum of one hundred and sixteen million of dollars 
more desirable than the sum of eleven hundred million of dollars? "When 
a man has land for sale, does he reject thirty-six dollars per acre and 
take three? Non-slaveholding whites! look well to your interests! 
Many of you have lands ; comparatively speaking, you have nothing else. 
Abolish slavery, and you will enhance the value of every league, your 



194 FEEE riGTJKES AND SLAVE. 

own and your neighbors', from three to thirty-six dollars per acre. Your 
little tract containing two hundred acres, now valued at the pitiful sum 
of only six hundred dollars, will then he worth seven thousand. Your 
children, now deprived of even the meagre advantages of common 
schools, will then reap the benefits of a collegiate education. Your rivers 
and smaller streams, now wasting their waters in idleness, will then turn 
the wheels of multitudinous mills. Your bays and harbors, now unknown 
to commerce, will then swarm with ships from every enlightened quar- 
ter cf the globe. Non-slaveholding whites ! look well to your interests ! 

Would the slaveholders of JTorth Carolina lose anything by the aboli- 
tion of slavery ? Let us see. According to their own estimate, their 
slaves are worth, in round numbers, say, one hundred and twenty mil- 
lions of dollars. There are in the State twenty-eight thousand slave- 
holders, owning, it may be safely assumed, an average of at least five 
hundred acres of land each — fourteen million of acres in aU. This num- 
ber of acres, multiplied by thirty-three dollars and ninety-one cents, the 
difference in value between free soil and slave sod, makes the enormous 
sum of four hundred and seventy -four million of dollars — showing that 
by the abolition of slavery, the slaveholders themselves would realize a 
net profit of not less than three hundred and fifty -four million of dollars. 

Not long since, a gentleman in Baltimore, a native of Maryland, re- 
marked in our presence that he was an abolitionist because he felt that 
it was right and proper to be one; "but," inquired he, " are there not, 
in some of the States, many widows and orphans who would be left 
in destitute circumstances, if their negroes were taken from them ?" "We 
replied that slavery had already reduced thousands and tens of thousands 
of non-slaveholding widows and orphans to the lowest depths of poverty 
and ignorance, and that we did not believe one slaveholding widow and 
three orphans were of more, or even of as much consequence as five non- 
slaveholding widows and fifteen orphans. "You are right," exchiimed 
the gentleman, " you are right, I had not viewed the subject in that light 
before ; I perceive you go in for the greatest good to the greatest num- 
ber." Of course we were right — we do go in for the greatest good to 
the greatest number. 

The fact is, every slave in the South costs the State in which he re- 
sides at least three times as much as he, in the whole course of his life, 
is worth to his master. Slavery benefits no one but its immediate, indi- 
vidual owners, and them only in a pecuniary point of view, and at the 
sacrifice of the dearest rights and interests of the whole mass of non- 
slaveholders, white and black. Even the masters themselves, as we have 
already shown, would have been far better off without it than with it. 
To all classes of society the institution is a curse ; an especial curse is it 
to those who own it not. Non-slaveholding whites ! look well to your 
interests ! 



OHAPTEE X. 

COMMEKOIAL CITIES — SOUTHEEX COilMEECE. 

If great improvements are seldom to be expected from great proprietors, they are least of 
all to be expected when they employ slaves for their workmen. The experience of all ages 
and nations, I believe, demonstrates that the work done by slaves, though it appears to cost 
only their maintenance, is in the end the dearest of any. A person who can acquire no 
property, can have no interest but to eat as much, and to labor as little as possible. What- 
ever work he does beyond what is sufficient to purchase his own maintenance, can be squeezed 
out of him by violence only, and not by any interest of his own. — Adam Smith. 

OuE theme is a city — a great Soutliern importing, exporting and 
manufacturing city, to be located at some point or port on the coast of 
the Carolinas, Georgia or Virginia, where we can carry on active com- 
merce, buy, sell, fabricate, receive the profits which accrue from the ex- 
change of our own commodities, open facilities for direct communication 
with foreign countries, and establish all those collateral sources of wealth, 
utility and adornment, which are the usual concomitants of a metropo- 
lis, and which add so very materially to the interest and importance of 
a nation. Without a city of this kind, the South can never develop her 
commercial resources nor attain to that eminent position to which those 
vast resources would otherwise exalt her. According to calculations 
based upon reasonable estimates, it is owing to the lack of a great com- 
mercial city in the South, that we are now annually drained of more 
than One Hundred and Twenty Millions of Dollars ! "We should, how- 
ever, take into consideration the negative loss as well as the positive. 
Especially should we think of the influx of emigrants, of the visits of 
strangers and cosmopolites, of the patronage to hotels and public halls, 
of the profits of travel and transportation, of the emoluments of foreign 
and domestic trade, and of numerous other advantages which have 
their origin exclusively in wealthy, enterprising and densely populated 
cities. 

Nothing is more evident than the fact, that our people have never 
entertained a proper opinion of the importance of home cities. Blindly, 
and greatly to our own injury, we have contributed hundreds of millions 
of dollars toward the erection of mammoth cities at the North, while 
our own magnificent bays and harbors have been most shamefully dis- 
regarded and neglected. Now, instead of carrying all our money to 
New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Cincinnati, suppose we had kept it 

195 



196 COMMEECIAL CITIES SOUTHERN COMMERCE. 

on the south side of Mason and Dixon's line — as we would have done, 
had it not been for slavery — and had disbursed it in the upbuilding of 
Norfolk, Beaufort, Charleston or Savannah, how much richer, better, 
greater would the South have been to-day ? . How much larger and 
more intelligent would have been our population ? How many hundred 
thousand natives of the South would now be thriving at home, instead 
of adding to the wealth and political power of other parts of the Union ? 
How much greater would be the number and length of our railroads, 
canals, turnpikes and telegraphs? How much greater would be the 
extent and diversity of our manufactures ? How much greater would 
be the grandeur, and how much larger would be the number of our 
churches, theatres, schools, colleges, lyceums, banks, hotels, stores and 
private dwellings ? How many more clippers and steamships would we 
have sailing on the ocean, how vastly more reputable would we be 
abroad, how infinitely more respectable, progressive and happy would we 
be at home ? 

That we may learn something of the importance of cities in general, 
let us look for a moment at the great capitals of the world. "What 
would England be without London ? "What would France be without 
Paris? "What would Turkey be without Constantinople? Or, to come 
nearer home, what would Maryland be without Baltimore? "What 
would Louisiana be without New Orleans ? What would South Caro- 
lina be without Charleston ? Do we ever think of these countries or 
States without thinking of their cities also ? If we want to learn the 
news of the country, do we not go to the city, or to the city papers ? 
Every metropolis may be regarded as the nucleus or epitome of the 
country in which it is situated ; and the more prominent features and 
characteristics of a country, particularly of the people of a country, are 
almost always to be seen within the limits of its capital city. Almost 
invariably do we find the bulk of the floating funds, the best talent, and 
the most vigorous energies of a nation concentrated in its chief cities ; 
and does not this concentration of wealth, energy and talent conduce, 
in an extraordinary degree, to the growth and prosperity of a nation? 
Unquestionably. AVealth develops wealth, energy develops energy, 
talent develops talent. What, then, must be the condition of those 
countries which do not possess the means or facilities of centralizing 
their material forces, their energies and their talents? Are they not 
destined to occupy an inferior rank among the nations of the earth? 
Let the South answer. 

And now let us ask, and we would put the question particularly to 
Southern merchants, what do we so much need as a great Southern 
metropolis ? Merchants of the South, slaveholders ! you are the avari- 
cious assassinators of your country ! You are the channels through 
which more than one hundred and twenty millions of dollars — 



COMMEKCIAL CITIES SOUTHEKN CO^IMEECE. 197 

$120,000,000 — are annually drained from the South and conveyed to 
the North. You are daily engaged in the unmanly and unpatriotic 
work of impoverishing the land of your birth. You are constantly 
enfeebling our resources and rendering us more and more tributary to 
distant parts of the nation. Your conduct is reprehensible, base, 
criminal. 

Whether Southern merchants ever think of the numerous ways in 
which they contribute to the aggrandizement of the North, while, at the 
same time, they enervate and dishonor the South, has for many years, 
with us, been a matter of more than ordinary conjecture. If, as it 
would seem, they have never yet thought of the subject, it is certainly 
desirable that they should exercise their minds upon it at once. Let 
them scrutinize the workings of Southern money after it passes north of 
Mason and Dixon's line. Let them consider how much they pay 
to Northern railroads and hotels, how much to Northern merchants 
and shopkeepers, how much to Northern shippers and insurers, how 
much to Northern theatres, newspapers, and periodicals. Let them 
also consider what disposition is made of it after it is lodged in 
the hands of the North. Is not the greater part of it paid out to 
Northern manufacturers, merchants, and laborers, for the very arti- 
cles which are purchased at the North — and to the extent that this is 
done, are not Northern manufacturers, mechanics, and laborers directly 
countenanced and encouraged, while, at the same time, Southern manu- 
facturers, mechanics, and laborers, are indirectly abased, depressed, and 
disabled? It is, however, a matter of impossibility, on these small 
pages, to notice or enumerate all the methods in which the money we 
deposit in the North is made to operate against us ; suffice it to say that 
it is circulated and expended there, among all classes of the people, to 
the injury and impoverishment of all almost every individual in the 
South. And yet, our cousins of the North are not, by any means, 
blameworthy for availing themselves of the advantages which we have 
voluntarily yielded to them. They have shown their wisdom in grow- 
ing great at our expense, and we have shown our folly in allowing 
them to do so. In this respect. Southern merchants, slaveholders, and 
slavebreeders, should be the special objects of our censure ; they have 
desolated and impoverished the South ; they are now making merchan- 
dise of the vitals of their country ; patriotism is a word nowhere 
recorded in their vocabulary; town, city, country — they care for 
neither; with them, self is always paramount to every other con- 
sideration. 

From letters received in 1857, from the mayors of eighteen of our 
great commercial cities, nine free, and nine slave, which letters have 
been published in all the book editions of this work, we present the 
following important particulars : 



198 



COMMERCIAL CITIES SOUTHERN COMMERCE. 



NINE FREE CITIES. 



Xame. 


Population. 


Wealth. 


Wealth 
per capita. 


New York 


700,000 
5ii0,0ii0 
1(55,(00 
225,0(10 
21O,(j00 
112,000 
60,(00 
90,000 
21.000 


$511,740,492 

325.000,000 

249,162,500 

95,S0U,440 

&S,S10,734 

171,000,(100 

58,004.516 

45,474,476 

27,047,000 


1731 


Philadelphia 

Boston 


650 

1,510 

425 




422 




1,527 




967 


Buffalo 


5ii5 


New Bedford 


1,2SS 








2,0S3,000 


|1,572,100,15S 


$754 



NINE SLATE CITIES. 



Name. 


Population. 


vrealth. 


Wealth 
per capita. 




250,000 
175,000 
140,0(10 
60,000 
70,000 
40,000 
17,000 
25,000 
10,000 


$t02,r'53 839 
91,1=8,195 
63,0 10.0110 
3ii,127,761 
81,500,000 
20,143 .520 
12,000.('00 
11,999,015 
7,850,000 


$408 




521 


St. Louis 


450 
602 




450 




503 


Norfolk 


705 




480 




785 








787,000 


$375,862,320 


$477 



Let it not be forgotten that the slaves themselves are valued at so 
mucli per head, and counted as part of the wealth of slave cities ; and 
yet, though we assent, as we have done, to the inclusion of all this ficti- 
tious wealth, it will be observed that the residents of free cities are far 
wealthier, per cainta, than the residents of slave cities. The reader, we 
trust, will not fail to examine the figures with great care. 

In this age of the world, commerce is an indispensable element of 
national greatness. Without commerce we can have no great cities, and 
without great cities we can have no reliable tenure of distinct nationality. 
Commerce is the forerunner of wealth and population ; and it is mainly 
these that make invincible the power of undying states. 

How it is, in this enlightened age, that men of ordinary intelligence 
can be so far led into error as to suppose that commerce, or any other 
noble enterprise, can be established and successfully prosecuted under 
the dominion of slavery, is, to us, one of the most inexplicable of mys- 
teries. Southern Conventions, composed of the self-titled lordlings of 
slavery. Generals, Colonels, Majors, Captains, and Squires — may act out 
their annual programmes of farcical nonsense from now until doomsday ; 
but they will never add one iota to the material, moral, or mental inter- 
ests of the South — never can, until their ebony idol shall have been 
utterly demolished. 

It is a remarkable fact, but one not at all surprising to those whose 



COMMERCIAL CITIES SOUTHERN COMMERCE. 199 

philosophy leads them to think aright, that Baltimore and St. Louis, the 
two most prosperous cities in the slave States, have fewer slaves in pro- 
portion to the aggregate population than any other city 01' cities in the 
South. While the entire population of the former is now estimated at 
250,000, and that of the latter at 140,000 — making a grand total of 
31)0,000 in the two cities, less than 6,000 of this latter numher are slaves; 
indeed, neither city is cursed with half the numher of 6,000. 

In 1850, there were only 2,946 slaves in Baltimore, and 2,656 in St. 
Louis — total in the two cities, 5,602 ; and in both places, thank heaven, 
this heathenish class of the population was rapidly decreasing. The 
census of 1860 will, in all probability, show that the two cities are en- 
tirely exempt from slaves and slavery ; and that of 1880 will, we prayer- 
fully hope, show that the United States at large, at that time, will have 
been wholly redeemed from the unspeakable curse of human bondage. 

What about Southern commerce ? Is it not almost entirely tributary 
to the commerce of the North ? Are we not dependent on New York, 
Philadelphia, Boston, and Cincinnati, for nearly every article of mer- 
chandise, whether foreign or domestic ? Where are our ships, our mari- 
ners, our naval architects ? Alas ! echo answers where ? 

Eeader ! would you understand how abjectly slaveholders themselves 
are enslaved to the products of Northern industry ? If you would, fix 
your mind on a Virginia gentleman — a breeder, buyer, and seller of 
bipedal black cattle — who, withal, professes to be a Christian ! Observe 
the routine of his daily life. See him rise in the morning from a 
Northern bed, and clothe himself in Northern apparel ; see him walk 
across the tioor on a Northern carpet, and perform his ablutions out of a 
Northern ewer and basin. See him uncover a box of Northern powders, 
and cleanse his teeth with a Northern brush ; see him reflecting his 
physiognomy in a Northern mirror, and arranging his hair with a 
Northern comb. See him dosing himself with the medicaments of 
Northern quacks, and perfuming his handkerchief with Northern cologne. 
See him referring to the time in a Northern watch, and glancing at the 
news in a Northern gazette. See him and his family sitting in Northern 
chairs, and singing and praying out of Northern books. See him at the 
breakfast table, saying grace over a Northern plate, eating with Northern 
cutlery, and drinking from Northern utensils. See him charmed with 
the melody of a Northern piano, or musing over the pages of a Northern 
novel. See him riding to his neighbor's in a Northern carriage, or fur- 
rowing his lands with a Northern plough. See him lighting his cigar with 
a Northern match, and flogging his negroes with a Northern lash. See 
him with Northern pen and ink, writing letters on Northern paper, and 
sending them away in Northern envelopes, sealed wdth Northern wax, 
and impressed with a Northern stamp. Perhaps our Virginia gentle- 
man is a merchant ; if so, see him at his store, making an unpatriotic 



200 COMMERCIAL CITIES — SODTHEKN COMMERCE. 

— - ^f his time in the miserahle traffic of Northern gimcracks and haber- 

^- -n vou will, Avhere you will, he is ever surrounded 

ie whom, in the strange inconsistency 

01 ^, es, yet treats as friends. Eis labors, 

his talents, his intlucuv., or the North, and not for the South. 

For the stability of slavery, and for the sake of his own personal aggran- 
dizement, he is willing to sacrifice, and does sacrifice, the dearest inter- 
ests of his country. 

As we see our ruinous system of commerce exemplified in the family 
of our Virginia gentleman — a branch of one of the Jirst families, of 
course! — so we may see it exemplified, to a greater or lesser degree, in 
almost every other family throughout the length and breadth of the 
slaveholding States. We are all constantly buying, and selling, and 
wearing, and using Northern merchandise, at a double expense to both 
ourselves and our neighbors. If we but look at ourselves attentively, 
we shall find that we are all clothed cap-d-pie in Northern habiliments. 
Our hats, our caps, our cravats, our coats, our vests, our pants, our 
gloves, our boots, our shoes, our under-garments — all come from the 
North • whence, too, Southern ladies procure all their bonnets, plumes, 
and flowers ; dresses, shawls, and scarfs ; frills, ribbons, and rufiles ; cuffs, 
capes, and collars. 

True it is that the South has wonderful powers of endurance and recuper- 
ation ; but she cannot forever support the reckless prodigality of her sons. 
We are all spendthrifts ; some of us should become financiers. We must 
learn to take care of our money ; we should Avithhold it from the North, 
and open avenues for its circulation at home. We should not run to 
New York to Philadelphia, to Boston, to Cincinnati, or to any other 
Northern city, every time we want a shoe-string, or a bedstead, a fish- 
hook or a hand-saw, a tooth-pick or a cotton-gin. In ease and luxury 
we have been lolling long enough ; we should now bestir ourselves, and 
keep pace with the progress of the age. We must expand our energies, 
and acquire habits of enterprise and industry ; we should arouse our- 
selves from the couch of lassitude, and inure our minds to thought and 
our bodies to action. We must begin to feed on a more substantial diet 
than that of pro-slavery politics; we should leave off our siestas and 
post-meridian naps, and employ our time in profitable vocations. 
Before us there is a vast work to be accomplished— a work which has 
been accumulating on our hands for many years. It is no less a work 
than that of infusing the spirit of liberty into all our systems of com- 
merce, agriculture, manufactures, government, literature, and religion. 
Oligarchal despotism must be overthrown ; slavery must be abolished. 

9* 



CHAPTER XL 

FACTS AND AEGUMENTS BY THE WAYSIDE. 

Slavery is the Infringement of all laws. A law having a tendency to preserve slavery 
would be the grossest sacrilege. Man to be possessed by his fellow-man ! — man to be made 
property of ! The image of the Deity to be put under the yoke ! Let these usurpers show 
us their title-deeds ! — Bolivar. 

FiNDiXG that we shall have to leave unsaid a great many things which 
we intended to say, and that we shall have to omit much valuable 
matter, the product of other pens than our own, but which, having col- 
lected at considerable labor and expense, we had hoped to be able to 
introduce, we have concluded to present, under the above heading, only 
a few of the more important particulars. 

In the first place, we will give an explanation of the reason 

WHY THE PRESENT VOLUME WAS NOT PUBLISHED IN BALTIMORE. 

A considerable portion of this work was written in Baltimore ; and 

the whole of it would have been written and published there, but for the 

following odious clause, which we extract from the Statutes of Maryland : 

" Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Marj'Iand, That after the passage of 
this act, it shall not be lawful for any citizen of this State, knowingly to make, 
print, or engrave, or aid in the making, printing, or engraving, within this State, 
any pictorial representation, or to write or print, or to aid in the writing or printing 
any pamphlet, newspaper, handbill or other paper of an inflammatory character, 
and having a tendency to excite discontent, or stir up insurrection amongst the 
people of color of this State, or of either of the other States or Territories of the 
United States, or knowingly to carry or send, or to aid in the carrying or sending 
the same for circulation amongst the inhabitants of either of the other States or 
Territories of the United States, and any person so offending shall be guilty of a 
felony, and shall on conviction be sentenced to confinement in the penitentiary of 
this State, for a period not less than ten nor more than twenty years, from the time 
of sentence pronoimced on such person." — Act passed Dec. 1831. See 2d Doi'sey, 
page 1218. 

Now, SO long as slaveholders are clothed with the mantle of office, so 
long will they continue to make laws, like the above, expressly calcu- 
lated to bring the non-slaveholding whites under a system of vassalage 
little less onerous and debasing than that to which the negroes them- 
selves are accustomed. What wonder is it that there is no native litera- 
ture in the South ? The South can never have a literature of her own 
until after slavery shall have been abolished. Slaveholders are either 
too lazy or too ignorant to write it, and the non-slaveholders — even the 
few whose minds are cultivated at all — are not permitted even to make 
the attempt. Down with the oligarchy! Ineligihility of slaveholders— 
never another vote to the tratScker in human flesh ! 

9* 201 



202 FACTS AND ARGUMENTS BY THE WAYSIDE. 



SLAVEET TnOUGHTFUL — SIGNS OF OONTEITION. 

The real condition of the South is most graphically described in the 
following doleful admissions from the Charleston Standard: 

"In its every aspect, our present condition is provincial. We have within our 
limits no solitary metropolis of interest or ideas — no marts of exchange — no radiat- 
ing centres of opinion. Whatever we have of genius and productive energj', goes 
freely in to swell the importance of the North. Possessing the material which con- 
stitutes two-thirds of the commerce of the whole country, it might have been sup- 
posed that we could have influence upon the councils of foreign States; but we are 
never taken into contemplation. It might have been supposed that England, 
bound to us by the cords upon which depend the existence of four millions of her 
subjects, would be considerate of our feelings ; but receiving her cotton from the 
North, it is for them she has concern, and it is her interest and her pleasure to 
reproach us. It might have been supposed, that, producing the material which is 
sent abroad, to us would come the articles that are taken in exchange for it; but 
to the North they go for distribution, and to us are parcelled out the fabrics that 
are suited to so remote a section. 

Instead, therefore, of New York being tributary to Norfolk, Charleston, Savan- 
nah or New Orleans, these cities are tributary to New York. Instead of the mer- 
chants of New York standing cap in hand to the merchants of Charleston, the mer- 
chants of Charleston stand cap in hand to the merchants of New York. Instead of 
receiving foreign ships in Southern waters, and calling up the merchants of the 
country to a distribution of the cargo, the merchants of the South are hurried off 
to make a distribution elsewhere. In virtue of our relations to a greater system, 
we have little development of internal interests ; receiving supplies from the great 
centre, we have made little effort to supply ourselves. We support the makers of 
boots, shoes, hats, coats, shirts, flannels, blankets, carpets, chairs, tables, mantels, 
mats, carriages, jewelry, cradles, couches, cofiBns, by the thousand and hundreds of 
thousands ; but they scorn to live amongst us. They must have the gaieties and 
splendors of a great metropolis, and are not content to vegetate uj^on the dim 
verge of this remote frontier. 

As it is in material interests, so it is in arts and letters — our pictures are painted 
at the North, our books are published at the North, our periodicals and papers are 
printed at the North. We are even fed on police reports and villainy from the 
North. The papers published at the South which ignore the questions at issue 
between the sections are generally well sustained; the books which expose the 
evils of our institution are even read with avidity beyond our limits, but the ideas 
that are turned to the condition of the South are intensely provincial. If, as 
things now are, a man should rise with all the genius of Shakspeare, or Dickens, or 
Fielding, or of all the three combined, and speak from the South, he would not 
receive enough to pay the costs of publication. If published at the South, his 
book would never be seen or heard of, and published at the North it would not be 
read. So perfect is our provincialism, therefore, that enterprise is forced to the 
North for a sphere — talent for a market — genius for the ideas upon which to work 
— indolence for ease, and the tourist for attractions." 

This extract exhibits in bold relief, and in small space, a large number 
of the present evils of past errors. It is charmingly frank and truthful. 
De Quincey's "Confessions of an Opium Eater," are nothing to it. A 
distinguished writer on medical jurisprudence informs us that " the 
knowledge of the disease is half the cure ; " and if it be true, as perhaps 
it is, we think the Standard is in a fair way to be reclaimed from the 
enormous vices of pro-slavery statism. 

FKEE LABOE MOVEMENTS IN THE SOUTH. 

Those of our readers who share with us the conviction that one of 
the very best means of ridding the South of the great crime and curse 



FACTS AND ARGUMENTS BY THE WATSroE. 



203 



of slavery, is, by a system of thorough orgaaizatioa on the part of a 
considerable number of individuals, to bring Free Labor into direct 
competition with Forced Labor, will also share with ns the profound 
satisfaction of learning, from the following communication, that the 
united eftbrts of gentlemen of noble instincts and purposes have been 
eminently successful in this regard ; and that the future is glowing with 
promises of grand results which are destined soon to be brought about 
through the energy and patriotism of such companies and corporations 
as the one in question : 

" Office of the American Emigrakt Aid and Homestead Company, I 
No. 146 Broadway, New York, June ith, 1859. ( 
" H. E. Helper, Esq.: 

" Dear Sir : In fulfillment of my promise, I will try to give you an outline of 
the object and operations of the American Emigrant Aid and Homestead Company. 
Your • Impending Crisis ' has abundantly demonstrated the fact, that land in the 
slave States is valued, purchased and sold at prices many times less than the same 
quality of land will command in the free States. It is likewise easy to show that, 
in the border slave States, counties comparatively free are worth many times as 
much per acre as land of the same quality in counties cursed with the incubus of 
slavery. 

" In the little State of Delaware, containing only three counties, nearly all the 
slaves are found in the Southern county of Sussex, which by the last census was 
appraised at $8 per acre, while the Northern county of Newcastle, without slaves, 
was, by the same census, appraised at over $28 per acre. The fact above stated 
is also very clearly shown by the statistics of the following counties in Virginia: 



Name. 


Acres. 


Valuation. 


Val. per acre. 


Freemen. 


Slaves. 


Hancock 

Brooke 

Ohio . 


49,To9 
62,441 
59.731 

3:!5,691 

156 9S8 


$1,181,512 

1,316,591 

2.025,951 

1,068,103 

427,173 


123 75 

25 10 

84 00 

3 01 

2 70 


4,047 
5,023 
17,842 
7,766 

1,854 


3 
81 

164 


Southampton 

Greenville 


5,755 
S,7S5 



" It is worthy of note that the comparatively free counties here given, are very 
hilly, far from tide water, and settled within the last fifty or sixty years, while the 
slave counties have a beautiful, gently rolling surface, lie near tide water, and the 
unequalled harbor of Norfolk, and have had the advantage of cultivation for nearly 
two hundred years. The Homestead Company, looking at these facts, proposes 
Christian colonization in the border slave States, not by single or separate settle- 
ment, but by organized emigration, carrying with it all the schools, churches, 
habits of industry, social institutions, and elements of a high civilization ; and 
thus, settling large tracts by united and sympathizing compames of liberty and 
Union-loving men, their investments are quadrupled in value by the mere act of 
settlement. We believe there is no department of human enterprise more benehted 
by system and cooperation, than that of emigration. Our experience has amply 
proved that this plan is not only profitable to all parties concerned as a fanancial 
operation, but that it furnishes the most feasible means of extending the Empire ol 
Freedom and genuine Christianity, and is. in fact, one of the most inviting and 
beneficent enterprises of the age. We feel confident that our movement ot cmi- 
certed emigration has already^lemontratod the truth of the proposition, that free- 
dom, like godliness, ' is profitable for the life that now is, as well as that which is 
to come ;' and that it has opened an easy, practicable, and profitable way to estab- 
lish free institutions in all the border slave States. , c^ * err- ■ ■ 

" Our operations have been thus far confined principally to the State ot Virginia, 
and the results, to myself have been highly gratifying. One of the outgrowths of 
our enterprise, has been the establishment of freedom of speech. During the 
last year I have been allowed a liberty of discussion on the subject of slavery, 
which, in 185G, would have demanded my blood or banishment. Indeed, in tfie 
towns of Western Virginia I have been serenaded, and invited to public entertain- 
ments, and to make addresses upon that subject so lately proscribed, and scarcely 



204: FACTS AND ARGUMENTS BY THE WAYSIDE. 

breathed without incurring the penalty of exile or ostracism. Wo have now, in 
Western Virginia, three excellent weekly Republican papers, and one daily and 
tri-weekly, and we expect shortly to welcome several others to the ranks of free 
dom. These are but a few of the many encouraging results of our experiment. 
" In the cause of liberty and humanity, 
" Yours truly, 

"John C. Undekwood." 

As well might the Oligarchy attempt to stay the flux and reflux of the 
tides, as to attempt to stay the progress of Freedom in the South. Ap- 
proved of God, the edict of the genius of Universal Emancipation has 
been proclaimed to the world, and nothing, save Deity himself, can 
possibly reverse it. To connive at the perpetuation of slavery is to 
disobey the commands of heaven. Not to be an Abolitionist, is to be a 
willful and diabolical instrument of the devil. The South needs to be 
free, the South wants to be free, the South shall be free ! 

To all our readers, especially to our Southern readers, we cordially 
commend the' following list of 

EKPUBLIOAN NEWSPAPERS PUBLISHED IN THE SLAVE STATES. 
ENGLISH. 

The Missouri Democrat St. Louis, Missouri. 

The Free South Newport, Kentucky. 

The Wheeling Intelligencer Wheeling, Virginia. 

The IVellsburg Herald Wellsburo- " 

The Ceredo Crescent Ceredo " " 

The National Era Washington, D. C. 

TTie Republic u u 

The News and Advertiser , Milford, Delaware. 

GERMAN. 

JDer Anzeiger des Westens St. Louis, Missoui-i. 

Die Westliclie Post " n 

Das Hermann Wochenblatt Hermann " 

Der St. Charles Demokrat St. Charles ' ' 

Die Deutsche Zeitung St. Joseph ' ' ' 

Die 3Iissouri Post Kansas City " 

Der Louisviller Anzeiger .' .' .Louisville, Kentucky. 

Der Baltimore Wecker Baltimore, Maryland. 

Non-slaveholders of the South ! it is of the highest importance to you 
that these papers should be well sustained, and that ample encourage 
ment should be given for the establishment of others. Patronize as 
many of them as you can, consistently with your other duties and 
interests— subscribe for one at least— and lose no opportunity to extend 
their circulation among your neighbors. Just in proportion as the 
masses are enlightened will they love liberty and ablior slavery. 

THE ILLITERATE POOR WHITES OF THE SOUTH. 

Had we the power to sketch a true picture of life among the non- 
slaveholding whites of the South, every intelligent man who has a spark 
of philanthropy in his breast, and who should happen to gaze upon the 
picture, would burn with unquenchable indignation at that system of 



FACTS AND ARGUMENTS BY THE WAYSIDE. 205 

African slavery, which entails unutterable stupidity, shiftlessness and 
degradation on the superior race. It is quite impossible, however, to 
describe accurately the miserable condition of the class to which we 
refer. Their poverty, their ignorance and their comparative nothing- 
ness, as a power in the State, are deplorable in the extreme. The serfs 
of Russia have reason to congratulate themselves that they are neither 
the negroes nor the non-slaveholding whites of the South. Than the 
latter there can be no people in Christendom more unhappily situated. 
Below will be found a few extracts which will throw some light on the 
subject now under consideration. 

In an address which he delivered before the South Carolina Institute, 
in 1851, William Gregg says: 

■' From tlie best estimates that I have been able to make, I put down the white 
people who ought to work, and who do not, or who are so employed as to be 
wholly unproductive to the State, at one hundred and twenty-five thousand. Any 
man who is an observer of things could hardly pass through our country without 
being struck with the fact, that all the capital, enterprise and intelligence, is em- 
ployed in directing slave labor ; and the consequence is, that a large portion of our 
poor white people are wholly neglected, and are suffered to while away an exist- 
ence in a state but one step in advance of the Indian of the forest. It is an evil of 
vast magnitude, and nothing but a change in public sentiment will effect its cure. 
These people must be brought into daily contact with the rich and intelligent— they 
must be stimulated to mental action, and taught to appreciate education and the 
comforts of civilized life ; and this, we believe, may be effected only by the intro- 
duction of manufactures. My experience at Graniteville has satisfied me that unless 
our poor people can be brought together in villages, and some means of employ- 
ment afforded them, it will be an utterly hopeless effort to undertake to educate 
them. We have collected at that place about eight hundred people, and as likely 
looking a set of country girls as may l)e found— industrious and orderly people— but 
deplorably ignorant, three-fourths of the adults not being able to read or to write 
their own names. 

" It is only necessary to build a manufacturing village of shanties, in a healthy 
location, in any part of the State, to have crowds of these people around you, seek- 
ing employment at half the compensation given to operatives at the North. It is 
indeed painful to be brought in contact with such ignorance and degradation." 

Again, he asks : 

" Shall we pass unnoticed the thousands of poor, ignorant, degraded white peo- 
ple among us, who, in this land of plenty, live in comparative nakedness and star- 
vation? Many a one is reared in proud South Carolina, from birth to manhood, 
who has never passed a month in which he has not, some part of the time, been 
stinted for meat. Many a mother is there who will tell you that her children are 
but scantily provided with bread, and much more scantily with meat ; and, if they 
be clad with comfortable raiment, it is at the expense of these scanty allowances of 
food. These may be startling statements, but they are nevertheless true : and if not 
believed in Charleston, the members of our legislature who have traversed the State 
in electioneering campaigns, can attest the truth." 

Black slave labor, though far less valuable, is almost invariably better 
paid than free white labor. The reason is this : tlie fiat of the oligarchy 
has made it fashionable to " have negroes around," and there are, we 
are grieved to say, many non-slaveholding white sycophants, who, in 
order to retain on their premises a hired slave whom they falsely ima- 
gine secures to them not only the appearance of wealth, but also a posi- 
tion of high social standing in the community, keep themselves in a per- 
petual strait. 



206 FACTS AND AUGDMENTS BY TIIK WAYSIDE. 

In the spring of 1856, we made it our special business to ascertain the 
ruling rates of wages paid for labor, free and slave, in North Carolina. 
We found sober, energetic white men, between twenty and forty years 
of age, engaged in agricultural pursuits at a salary of $7 per month — 
including board only ; negro men, slaves, who performed little more 
than half the amount of labor, and who were exceedingly sluggish, awk- 
ward, and careless in all their movements, were hired out on adjoining 
farms at an average of about $10 per month, including board, cloth- 
ing, and medical attendance. Free white men and slaves were in the 
employ of the North Carolina Railroad Company ; the former, whose 
services, in our opinion, were at least twice as valuable as the latter, 
received only $12 per month each ; the masters of the latter received 
$16 per month for every slave so employed. Industrious, tidy white 
girls, from sixteen to twenty years of age, had much difficulty in hiring 
themselves out as domestics in private families for $40 per annum — 
board only included ; negro wenches, slaves, of corresponding ages, so 
ungraceful, stupid and filthy that no decent man would ever permit one 
of them to cross the threshold of his dwelling, were in brisk demand at 
from $65 to $70 per annum, including victuals, clothes, and medical 
attendance. These are facts, and in considering them, the students of 
political and social economy will not fail to arrive at conclusions of their 
own. 

Notwithstanding the greater density of population in the free States, 
labor of every kind is, on an average, about one hundred per cent, higher 
there than it is in the slave States. This is another important fact, and 
one that every non-slaveholding white should keep registered in his 
mind. 

Poverty, ignorance, and superstition, are the three leading character- 
istics of the non-slaveholding whites of the South. Many of them grow 
up to the age of maturity, and pass through life without ever own- 
ing as much as five dollars at a time. Thousands of them die at an 
advanced age, as ignorant of the common alphabet as if it had never 
been invented. All are more or less impressed with a belief in witches, 
ghosts, and supernatural signs. Few are exempt from habits of sensu- 
ality and intemperance. None have anything like adequate ideas of the 
duties which they owe either to their God, to themselves, or to their 
fellow-men. Pitiable, indeed, in the fullest sense of the term, is their 
condition. 

It is the almost utter lack of an education that has reduced them to 
their present unenviable situation. They are now completely under 
the domination of the oligarchy, and it is madness to suppose that they 
will ever be able to rise to a position of true manhood, until after the 
slave power shall have been utterly overthrown. 



CHAPTER XII. 

SOUTHERN LITEEATXTEE. 

Meanwhile a change was proceeding, infinitely more momentous than the acquisition or loss 
of any province, than the rise or fall of any dynasty. Slavery, and the evils by which 
slavery is everywhere accompanied, were fast disappearing. — Macaulat. 

My voice is still for war. 
Gods ! can a Roman Senate long debate 
Which of the two to choose, slavery or death ? 
itc * * * * * 

A day — an hour of virtuous Liberty 
Is worth a whole eternity of bondage 1 

Addison. 

Write, speak, avenge, for ancient sufferings feel, 
Impale each tyrant on their pens of steel, 
Declare how freemen can a world create, 
And slaves and masters ruin every State. 

Barlow. 

It is with some degree of hesitation that we add a chapter on South- 
ern Literature — not that the theme is inappropriate to this work ; still 
less, that it is an unfruitful one ; but our hesitation results from our con- 
scious inability, in the limited time and space at our command, to do 
the subject justice. Few, except those whose experience has taught 
them, have any adequate idea of the amount of preparatory labor requi- 
site to the production of a work into which the statistical element largely 
enters ; especially is this so, when the statistics desired are not readily 
accessible through public and official documents. The author who 
honestly aims at entire accuracy in his statements, may find himself 
baffled for weeks in his pursuit of a single item of information, not of 
much importance in itself perhaps, when separately considered, but 
necessary in its connection with others, to the completion of a 
harmonious whole. Not unfrequently, during the preparation of the 
preceding pages, have we been subjected to this delay and annoy- 
ance. 

What is the actual condition of Literature at the South ? Our ques- 
tion includes more than simple authorship in the various departments of 
letters, from the compilation of a primary reader to the production of 
a Scientific or Theological Treatise. We comprehend in it all the activi- 
ties engaged in the creation, publication, and sale of books aud period- 

2UT 



208 BOTTTHEEN LITEEATUEE. 

icajs, from the penny primer to the heavy folio, and from the dingy, 
coarse-typed weekly paper, to the large, well-filled daily. 

Turning our attention to the periodical literature of the South, we 
ohtain these results: By the census of 1850, we ascertain that the 
entire number of periodicals, daily, semi-weekly, weekly, semi-monthly, 
monthly and quarterly, published in the slave Slates, including the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, were seven hundred and twenty-two. These had an 
aggregate yearly circulation of ninety-two million one hundred and 
sixty-seven thousand one hundred and twenty-nine (92,16V,120). The 
number of periodicals, of every class, published in the non-slaveholding 
States (exclusive of California) was one thousand eight hundred and 
ninety-three, with an aggregate yearly circulation of three hundred and 
thirty-three million three hundred and eighty-six thousand and eighty- 
one (333,386,081). 

Nearly nine years have elapsed since these statistics were taken, 
and these nine years have wrought an immense change in the jour- 
nalism of the North, without any corresponding change in that of 
the South. It is noteworthy that, as a general thing, the principal 
journals of the free States are more comprehensive in their scope, more 
complete in every department, and enlist, if not a higher order of talent, 
at least more talent, than they did nine years ago. This improvement 
extends not only to the metropolitan, but to the country papers also. 
In fact, the very highest literary ability, in finance, in political economy, 
in science, in statism, in law, in theology, in medicine, in belles-let- 
tres, is laid under contribution by the journals of the non-slavehold- 
ing States. This is true only to a very limited degree of Southern jour- 
nals. Their position, with but few exceptions, is substantially the same 
that it was ten years ago. They are neither worse nor better — the 
imbecility and inertia which attaches to everything which slavery 
touches, clings to them now as tenaciously as it did when Henry A. 
Wise thanked God for the paucity of newspapers in the Old Dominion, 
and the platitudes of Father Eitchie were recognized as the political 
gospel of the South. They have not, so far as we can learn, increased 
materially in number, nor in the aggregate of their yearly circulation. 
In the free States no week passes that does not add to the number of 
their journals, and extend the circle of their readers and their influence. 
Since the census tables to which we have referred were prepared, two 
of the many excellent weekly journals of which the city of New York 
can boast, have sprung into being, and attaine(.l an aggregate circu- 
lation more than twice as large as tliat of the entire newspaper press 
of Virginia in 1850 — and exceeding, by some thousands, the aggregate 
circulation of the two hundred and fifty journals of which Alabama, 
Arkansas, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina and Florida, could boast 
at the time above-mentioned. 



SOUTHERN LITEKATUEE. 



209 



Facts of great interest and importance appertaining to the two most 
widely circulated and influential journals in America — perhaps we 
might, with propriety, say in the world — will be found in the following 
carefully-prepared tabular statement : 



T^ B H, E 3 3. 

AGGREGATE ClRCtlLATION OF THE DAILY, SEMI-WEEKLY, AND WEEKLY NEW 
YORK TRIBUNE,* APRIL 25, 1859, AND OF THE DAILY NEW YORK HERALD,t 
AUGUST 2, 1S56. 



Free States. 

Tribune. Herald. 

California 2,4-31 

Connecticut 8,633 2,146 

Illinois 12,T69 853 

Indiana 10,098 36 

Iowa T,523 49 

Maine 7,67T 5S 

Massachusetts 8,154 1,058 

Michigan 9,264 256 

New Hampshire 6,239 139 

New Jersey 5,477 3,330 

New York 65,186 47,275 

Ohio 19,740 200 

Pennsylvania 15,292 2,510 

Rhode Island 2,151 322 

Vermont 8,242 135 

Wisconsin 8,042 33 



Totals 196,923. 



58,410 



Slave States. 
Tribune. 

Alabama 51 . 

Arkansas.. 10. 

Delaware 253. 

Florida 41 . 

Georgia 78. 

Kentucky 548 . 

Louisiana 108 

Maryland 467 . 

Mississippi 15 . 

Missouri 683. 

North Carolina. 57. 

South Carolina 45. 

Tennessee 307 . 

Texas 132. 

Virginia 375. 

District of Columbia 130. 



Herald. 

.. 80 



Totals 3,240. 



235 
45 

170 
68 
85 
1,153 
11 
41 
44 

189 
42 
5 

176 

317 

2,611 



Throughout the non-slaveholding States, the newspaper or magazine 
that has not improved during the last decade of years, is an exception to 
the general rule. Throughout the entire slaveholding States, the news- 
paper or magazine that has improved during that time, is no less an 
exception to the general rule that there obtains. Outside of the largeV 
cities of the South, there are not, probably, half a dozen newspapers in 
the whole slaveholding region that can safely challenge a comparison 
with the country press of the North. "What that country press was 
twenty years ago, the country press of the South is now. 

The self-stultification of folly, was never more evident than it is 
in the current gabble of the Oligarchs about a Southern literature. 
They do not mean by it a healthy, manly, moral utterance of unfettered 
minds, without which there can be no proper literature ; but an emascu- 
lated substitute therefor, from which the element of freedom is elimi- 
nated ; husks, from which the kernel has escaped — a body, from which 
the vitalizing spirit has fled — a literature which ignores manhood by 
confounding if with bruteh ood ; or, at best, deals with all similes of 
freedom as treason against the "peculiar institution." There is not a 
single great name in the literary annals of the old or new world that 
could dwarf itself to the stature requisite to gain admission into the 



* See The Tribune of April 25th and 27th, 1859. 
t See The Herald of August 6th, 1856. 



210 80UTHEKN LITEKATURE. 

Pantheon erected by these devotees of tlie Inane for their Lilliputian 
deities. Thank God, a Southern literature, in the sense intended by 
the champions of slavery, is a simple impossibility, rendered such by 
that exility of mind which they demand in its producers as a prerequi- 
site to admission into the guild of Southern authoi-ship. The tenuous 
thoughts of such authorlings could not survive a single breath of manly 
criticism. The history of the rise, progress and decline of their litera- 
ture could be easily written on a child's smooth palm, and leave space 
enough for its funeral oration and epitaph. The latter miglit appropri- 
ately be that which, in one of our rural districts, marks the grave of a 

still-born infant : 

" If so early I am done for, 
I wonder wliat I was begun for." 

"We desire to see the South bear its just proportion in the literary 
activities and achievements of our common country. It has never yet 
done so, and it never will until its own manhood is vindicated in the 
abolition of slavery. The impulse which such a measure would give to 
aU industrial pursuits that deal with the elements of mriterial prosperity, 
would be imparted also to the no less valuable but more intangible cre- 
ations of the mind. Take from the intellect of the South the incubus 
which now oppresses it, and its rebound would be glorious ; the era of 
its diviner inspirations would begin ; and its triumphs would be a per- 
petual vindication of the superiority of free institutions over those of 
slavery. 

The people of the South are not a reading people. Many of the 
adult population never learned to read ; still more, do not care to read. 
We have been impressed, during a temporary sojourn in the North, with 
the difference between the middle and laboring classes in the free States, 
and the same classes in the slave States, in this respect. Passing along 
the great routes of travel in the former, or taking our seat in the com- 
fortable cars that pass up and down the avenues of our great commer- 
cial metropolis, we have not failed to contrast the employment of our 
feUow-passengers with that which occupies the attention of the corres- 
ponding classes on our various Southern routes of travel. In the one 
case, a large proportion of the passengers seem intent upon mastering 
the contents of the newspaper, or some recently published book. The 
merchant, the mechanic, the artisan, the professional man, and even the 
common laborer, going to or returning from their daily avocations, are 
busy with their morning and evening paper, or engaged in an intelligent 
discussion of some topic of public interest. This is their leisui'e hour, 
and it is given to the acquisition of such information as may be of im- 
mediate or ultimate use, or to the cultivation of a taste for elegant litera- 
ture. In the other case, newspapers and books seem generally ignored, 
and noisy discussions of village and State politics, the tobacco and cotton 



SOUTHERN LITEEATTJRE. 



211 



crops, filibusterism in Cuba, Nicaragua, or Sonora, the price of negroes 
generally, and especially of "fine-looking wenches," the beauties of 
lynch-law, the delights of horse-racing, the excitement of street fights 
with bowie-knives and revolvers, the "manifest destiny" theory that 
justifies the stealing of all territory contiguous to .our own, and kin- 
dred topics, constitute the warp and woof of conversation. 

What follows, oui- readers will, we think, agree with us, is of great 
significance in this connection : 

t^ble: 34. 
nuimber op public documents franked by united states senators*— 1868. 

fuee state senators. slave state senators. 



state. 



Name. 



Docu- 
ments. 



California 

Connecticut. . . 

Illinois 

Indiana 

Iowa 

Maine 

Massachusetts. 

Michigan 

N. Hampshire . 
New Jersey . . . 

New York 

Ohio 

Pennsylvania. 
Rhode Island. 

Vermont 

Wisconsin . . . . 



Broderick 

Gwin 

Foster 

Dixon . . . 
Douglas. . . 
Trumbull. 

Fitch 

Bright ... 
Jones. . . . 
Harlan. .. 
Fessenden 
Hamlin . . 
Wilson . . . 
Sumner.. . 
Stuart ... 
Chandler . 

Hale 

Clark 

Wright . . . 
Thompson 
Seward. . . 

King 

PugU 

Wade .... 
Bigler .... 
Cameron . 

Allen 

ShumorLS. . 
CoUamer . 

Foot 

Durkee. .. 
Doohttle.. 



18,000 I 

19,000 S 

7,000 ( 

r 



345,000 
40,000 J 
11,000 j 
15,000 f 
4,000 > 
10,000 5 
14,000 I 
10,000 j 

i",666 \ 

49,000 ) 

214,000 f 

14,000 I 

51,000 f 

T,000 I 

1,000 ( 

81,000 / 

19,000 f 

4,000 ) 

2,ono f 

54,000 

10,000 C 

800 I 

2,500 ) 

3,000 J 

2,000 f 

6,500) 

4,000 ) 



Total, 



3T,500 

7,000 

885,000 

26,000 

14,000 

24,000 

1,000 

263,000 

65,000 

8,000 

100,000 

6,000 

64,000 
2,800 
5,000 

10,000 



State. 



Alabama . . . 
Arkansas . . . 
Delaware. . 

Florida 

Georgia 

Kentucky. . . 
Louisiana. . 
Maryland. . . 
Mississippi. . 

iSIissourl 

N. Caroluia. 
6. Carolina. 
Tennessee . . 

Te.xas 

Virginia . . . . 



Name. 



Fitzpatrick 

Clay 

Sebastian. . 
Johnson. .. 

Bates 

Bayard. .. 
Mallory . . . 

Yulee 

Iverson 

Toombs.. .. 
Thompson . 
Crittenden. 
Benjamin. . 

Slidell 

Pearce 

Kennedy. . 

Brown 

Davis 

Green 

Polk 

Reid 

Clingman. . 

Evans 

Hammond. 

Bell 

Johnson. .. 
Houston. . . 
Henderson. 

Mason 

Hunter .... 



1,500 

11,500 I 

2,000 I 

8,000 I 



6,000 ( 
2,000 ) 
3,000 I 
2,000 j 

10,606 ) 
11,000 I 
8,000 ) 
6,000 ( 
5,000 I 
18,000 

6,000 i 

12,000 I 

15,000 I 

1,000 I 

21,500 f 



7,000 
11,000 
5,000 



2,000 I 
2,000 ) 



Total. 



13,000 
10,000 



8,000 
5,000 
10,000 
19,000 
11,000 
24,000 
27,000 
22,500 



18,000 
5,000 
4,000 



Total 176,500 



Total 1,019,800 



Thus we perceive by the above table, that, while thirty-two Free State 
Senators send 1,019,800 documents— an average of 31,869 each, thirty 
Slave State Senators send only 176,500 documents— an average of but 
5,883 each, showing an average balance of 25,986 in favor of every 



* See debate on the proposed amendment to the Post-office bill, to increase the rates of 



ignor.-ince of slavery, as is shown in a preceding table, tho mails were transported through- 
out the Southern States, during the year 1855, at an e.\tra cost to the General Oovernmerit 
of more than six hundred thousand dollars ! In the free States, during the same period, 
postages were received to the amount of more than two million of dollars over and above 
the cost of transportation ! 



212 



SOUTHERN LITERATUEE. 



Free State Senator! Thus do the lazy pro-slavery officials of the South 
perpetuate the ignorance and degradation of their constituents, by with- 
holding from them — especially from their miserably-duped non-slave- 
holding constituents — the means of information to which they are justly 
entitled, and whicli they would receive, if represented by men whose 
sense of duty and honor was not irremediably debased by social contact 
with slaves and slavery. 

The proportion of white adults over twenty years of age, in each 
State, who cannot read and write, to the icTiole white population, is as 
follows : 



Connecticut 1 to every 668 



Vermont. 

New Hampshire . 

Massachusetts... 

Maine 

Michigan 

Rhode Island 



1 
1 

1 
1 
1 

1 

New Jersey 1 

New York 1 

Pennsylvania 1 

Ohio 1 

Indiana 1 

Illinois 1 



473 

310 

166 

108 

97 

67 

58 

56 

60 

43 

18 

17 



Louisiana 1 to every 3S^ 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Delaware 

South Carolina 

Missouri 

Alabama 

Kentucky 

Georgia 

Virginia 

Arkansas 

Tennessee 

North Carolina 







27 






20 






18 






17 






16 






15 






13 






13 






12j 






\\i 






11 






7 



In the slave States the proportion of free white children, between the 
ages of five and twenty, who are found at any school or college, is not 
quite one-fifth of the whole ; in the free States, the proportion is more 
than threefiftlis. 

We could fill our pages with facts like these to an almost indefinite 
extent, but it cannot be necessary. No truth is more demonstrable, 
nay, no truth has been more abundantly demonstrated, than this : that 
slavery is hostile to general education ; its strength, its very life, is in 
the ignorance and stolidity of the masses ; it naturally and necessarily 
represses general literary culture. A free press is an institution almost 
unknown at the South. Free speech is considered as treason against 
slavery : and when people dare neither speak nor print their thoughts, 
free thought itself is well-nigh extinguished. All that can be said in 
defence of human bondage may be spoken freely, but question either its 
morality or its policy, and the terrors of Lynch-law are at once invoked 
to put down the pestilent heresy. The legislation of the slave States 
for the suppression of the freedom of speech and tlie press, is disgi-aceful 
and cowardly to the last degree, and can find its parallel only in the 
meanest and bloodiest despotisms of the old world. No institution that 
could bear the light would thus sneakingly seek to burrow itself in utter 
darkness. Look, too, at the mobbings, lynchings, robberies, social and 
political proscriptions, and all manner of nameless outrages, to which 
men in the South have been subjected, simjjly upon the suspicion that 
they were the enemies of slavery. We could fill page after page of this 



SOUTHEEN LITEEATUEE. 213 

volume with the record of such atrocities. But a simple reference to 
them is enough. Our countrymen have not yet forgotten why John C. 
Underwood was, but a short while since, banished from his home in 
Virginia, and the accomplished Hedrick driven from his college pro- 
fessorship in North Carolina. They believed slavery inimical to the 
best interest of the South, and for daring to give expression to this belief 
in moderate yet manly language, they were ostracized by the despotic 
slave power, and compelled to seek a refuge from its vengeance in States 
where the principles of freedom are better understood. Pending the 
last Presidential election, there were thousands, nay, tens of thousands 
of voters in the slave States, who desired to give their suffrages for the 
Republican nominee, John C. Fremont, himself a Southron, but a non- 
slaveholder. The Constitution of the United States guaranteed to these 
men an expression of their preference at the ballot-box. But were 
they permitted such an expression ? Not at all. They were denounced, 
threatened, overawed, by the slave power — and it is not too much to 
say, that there was really no Constitutional election — that is, no such 
free expression of political preferences as the Constitution aims to secure 
— in a majority of the slave States. 

From a multiplicity of facts like these, the inference is unavoidable, 
that slavery tolerates no freedom of the press, no freedom of speech, no 
freedom of opinion. To expect that a whole-souled, manly literature 
can flourish under such conditions, is as absurd as it would be to look 
for health amid the pestilential vapors of a dungeon. 

The truth is, slavery destroys, or vitiates, or pollutes, whatever it 
touches. No interest of society escapes the influence of its clinging 
curse. It makes Southern religion a stench in the nostrils of Christen- 
dom — it makes Southern politics a libel upon all the principles of Repub- 
licanism — it makes Southern literature a travesty upon the honorable 
profession of letters. Than the better class of Southern authors them- 
selves, none will feel more keenly the truth of our remarks. They 
write books, but can find for them neither publishers nor remunera- 
tive sales at the South. The executors of Calhoun seek, for his works, a 
Northern publisher. Benton writes history and prepares voluminous 
compilations, which are given to the world through a Northern pub- 
lislier. Simms writes novels and poems, and they are scattered abroad 
from the presses of Northern publishers. Eighty per cent, of all the 
copies sold are probably l)ought by Northern readers. 

Om- limits, not our materials, are exhausted. We would gladly say 
more, but can only, in conclusion, add as the result of our investigations 
in this department of our subject, that Literature and Liberty are inse- 
parable ; the one can never have a vigorous existence without being 
wedded to the other. 



SJ14 SOUTHEEN LITEEATUKE. 

Our work is done. It is the voice of the non-slaveholding whites of 
the South, through one identified with them hy interest, by feeling, by 
position. That voice, by whomsoever spoken, must yet be heard and 
heeded. The time hastens — the doom of slavery is written — the redemp- 
tion of the South draws nigh. 

In taking leave of our readers, we know not how we can give more 
forcible expression to our thoughts and intentions tlian by saying that, 
in concert with the intelligent free voters of the North, we, the non- 
slaveholding whites of the South, desire and expect to elevate to the 
Presidency, in 1860, an able and wortliy representative of the great 
principles enunciated in the Eepublican platform adopted at Philadel- 
phia in 1856 ; and that, forever thereafter, we will, if we can, by our suf- 
frages, hold the Presidential chair, and other high oflacial positions in the 
Federal Government, sacredly intact from the occupancy and pollution 
of Pro-Slavery demagogues, whether from the North or from the South ; 
and furthermore, that if, in any case, the Oligarchs do not quietly sub- 
mit to the will of a constitutional majority of the people, as expressed 
at the ballot-bos, the first battle between Freedom and Slavery will be 
fought at home — and may God defend the Eight ! 



THB BND. 



COMPENDIUM 



IMPENDING CRISIS 



THE SOUTH. 



BY 

HINTON ROWAN HELPER, 

OF NORTH CAROLINA. 



Countrymen ! I sue for simple justice at your hands, 

Naught else I ask, nor less will have ; 

Act right, therefore, and yield my claim. 

Or, by the great God that made all things, 

I'll fight, till from my bones my flesh be hacVAl—Sfiakspeare, 

The Uberal deviseth liberal things, 

And by liberal things shall he stand. — Isaiah. 



NEW YORK : 
A. B. BURDICK, PUBLISHER, 

No. 8 SPRUCE STREET. 
1859. 

W. II. TiNSON, 43 & 45 Centre Street. 



In aid of the general fund for circulating one hundred thousand copies of the worlv 
hand,-- subscriptions, up to the 15th of June, 1859, amount to about $3,700, of which the 
llowing, as will respectively appear, liare been received in sums of from $10 to $250. 

Beers, Abucr, New York City $ 10 

Bonnoy, B. W., New York City 100 

Brown, Nicholas, Warwick, K. 1 100 

Biudick, Ashor B., Brooklyn, N. Y 100 

Clarke, James Freeman, Jamaica Plains, Mass 10 

Clay, Cassius M., Whitehall, Kentucky, 25 

Clay, Cassius M., for a Kentucky Clergyman, 250 

Clay, Cassius M. , for Several Persons 10 

Darrah, Eobert L. , New York City 10 

Dudley, E. G., Boston, Mass 50 

Endicott, William, Jr., Boston, Mass 100 

Farnum, Jonathan, Millville, Mass 10 

Fiske, Edwards W. , Brooklyn, New York 100 

Fosdick, Samuel, Cincinnati, Ohio 10 

French, Stiles, New Haven, Conn 10 

Frisbie, M. J., New York City 100 

Frothingham, 0. B., Jersey City, N. J 100 

Goodloe, D. R., and Friend, Washington, D. C 10 

Greeley, Horace, New York City 100 

Greenleaf, R. C, Boston, Mass 50 

Harris, Edward, Woonsocket, R. 1 100 

Hedrick, Benjamin S. , New York City 50 

Helper, Hinton R., " " " 100 

Hurlbut, F., Brooklyn, New York 25 

Jay, John, New York City 100 

Ketcham, Edgar, New York City 25 

McCaulley, William, Wilmington, Delaware 10 

Marble, Nathan, Port Byron, New York 10 

May, Samuel, Boston, Mass 100 

Morgan, Edwin D. , Albany, New York 100 

Nesmith, John, Lowell, Mass 100 

Norton, John T., Farmington, Conn 100 

Parsons, J. C, New York 10 

Pinner, M. , Kansas City, Missouri 10 

Plumly, Benjamin Rush, Philadelphia, Pa 100 

Randolph, Evan, Philadelphia, Pa ^ ) 

Republicans of Pottsville and N. Coventry, Pa. $40 ; Crown Point, N. Y. $11.. 51 

Republicans of Shawnee Mound, $20 ; South Bend, $10, Indiana o 

Roberts, W. S., New York City 10 

Robmson, Hanson, New Castle Co. , Delaware 20 

Ryerson, David, Newton, New Jersey 64 

Sherman, S. N., Ogdensburg, New York 32 

Smith, Gerrit, Peterboro, New York 20 

Spring, Marcus, Eagleswood, New Jersey 100 

Stober, John A ., Smyrna, New York 10 

Stranahan, J. S. T., Brooklyn, New York 100 

Tappan, Lewis, Brooklyn, New York 100 

Thomas, Wm. B., Philadelphia, Pa 100 

Tweedy, Edmund, Newport, R. 1 10 

Wadsworth, James S., New York City 100 

Wakeman, Abram, New York City 100 

Weed, Thurlow, Albany, New York 100 

White, Aaron, Thompson, Conn 10 

Wright, E. N. and James A., Philadelphia, Pa 30 

Wood, Bradford R., Albany, New York 100 

A. A. $50, B. B. $50, C. C. $10, D. D. $10, E. E. $20, F. F. $25, N. Carolina, 165 

S. F. M. Wilmington, Delaware 10 

A Friend, by S. E. Sewell, Boston, Mass., $10 ; E. B., Brookl)^l, N. Y., $25. . 35 

<> Sec fourth page of cover. Total, $3,518 



Were every citizen in possession of tlic facts enabodied in tliis compend of "The Im- - 
PENDING Crisis of the South," we feel confident that slavery would soon peacefully pass | 
iuvay, while a llepuhllcan triumph in 18G0 would he moially certain. It is believed tliat 
this testimony of a Southern man, born and reared under the influence of slavery, will 1 ^ 
more generally listened to and profoundly heeded, whether in the Slave or in the luie 
States, than an e(iiially able and conclusive work written by a Northern man ; and it is 
very desirable, therefore, that, in this cheap form, it should now be generally diffused in j 
those States— Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Indiana, and Illinois —which are to' decide the | 
next Presidential contest. ! 

One hundred thousand copies, the number which we propose to circulate, can be had ■ 
for sixlmi cents c«c/t— $1G,000 in the aggregate. This amount we propose to raise in such | 
sums as the friends of the enterprise feel disposed to subscribe. j 

In all cases, when convenient, contributors to the cause will please make their sub- i 
scriptions in the form of drafts, or certificates of deposit, payal)le to the order of the HdN. 
Wm. H. Antiion, 10 Exchange iJlace, New York City, our Treasurer and Disburser, ^vbo i 

IS) J I . 

will regularly, through the columns of the Trihime, acknowledge receipts of the same. | 
Every person who subscribes Ten Dollars or more, will, if timely application be maile, 
be entitled to as many copies of the compend for distribution as he may desire, not ( x- 
ceeding the number that the amount of his suljscriptiou would pay for at net co^t. 

Subscriliers' names, with the sums severallj'' subscribed by them, in all cases where the 
amount is Ten Dollars or more, will appear, alphabetically arranged, in the latter part of! 
the compend. '■- 

Correspondence or personal interviews in relation to this enterprise, may be had with 
anyone of the undersigned, who will be pleased to receive suliscriptions in aid of itpj 
speedy consummation. 

WM. II. ANTHON, Treasurer, 1G Exchange Place, New York. 
Samuel E. Sewall, Boston, Mass. Wm. McCaullev, Wilmingtoji, Dd. | 

Setii Padlei'ord, Providence, R. I. Wm. Gunnison, Baltimore, Md. 

Wm. B. Thomas, FMladelphia, Ba. Cassius M. Clav, WhiteJiall, Ky. 

JosEni Medill, Chicago, III. Frank P. Plair, Jr. St. Lords, Mo. j 

Lewis CLEniANE, Washington, D. C. 
The undersigned having Ijeen appointed a Committee in New York, to aid in the cir- 
culation of Mr. Helper's work, on the plan proposed above, beg leave to rccommeml the 
object to the public and ask their co-operation. | 

Subscriptions may be sent to the Hon. Wm. 11. Antlion, No. IG Exchange Place, New 
York, directly, or through cither of the undersigned. 

COMMITTEE. 

Charles W. Ellioit, Edgar Ketchum, 

David Dudley Field, Auram Wakeman, 

Charles A. Pkabody, James Kelly, 

_ ll^H^IcCuRDY, Bexj. F. Manierre, 

j\ X 4t m^i^Lrtis Noyes, James A. Briggs. 

* See 2>d2>age of cover. 



f 



» I ' \^' s «■ » f '^- " N 



.N 






•i , I ft •^** yi >> \ \ 















•^^ 



^■'"'"-K 



.y'\. 



A 



•/ 



<S. 






^ 



%4' 



.\^ 






.^^^ 



,v<^ 









O "^ r- 



















"^ \^- 






"^y. v^ 



.^^ --. 



^^ -^c^^ 



vO c 






iS' 












A^ , N c ■ 



.-^^^ 



^O 0^ 









^ y '^^^ 









x^ 



^' 












^^^ -n. 



<5^ 



.0 o 



\0 









-^. 



.' 4^^"% 



></>_ 



,0 o 






.-^^ 



00 






v^^ 



vOc 



» h 









■ '»■■' . < > 






■f/T 












